The couple moved to London during WW1, where Laura Knight specialised in studies of famous ballet dancers, including Anna Pavlova and Lydia Lopokova. After the war, she continued to portray dancers, actors and performers, especially circus scenes, and taught herself etching after acquiring George Clausen’s printing press. In 1929 Knight was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire, and three years later was elected president of the Society of Women Artists, also exhibiting with the Women’s International Art Club. In 1936 she became the first woman to be elected to full membership of the Royal Academy since its foundation.

She produced influential poster designs for the army, as well as paintings documenting the preparations for war as an Official War Artist from around 1940. In 1946 she attended the Nuremberg trials to make sketches commissioned by the War Artists’ Advisory Committee that were later realised on large-scale canvases (held at the Imperial War Museum).

She returned to her favoured subjects of theatre and country life, exhibited widely at the Royal Academy, the Leicester Galleries and Upper Grosvenor Galleries. Laura Knight died in London, England on 7 July 1970. Her works are represented in UK public collections including the Imperial War Museum, Leicester Museum & Art Gallery, National Portrait Gallery, Manchester Art Gallery, and the Tate.