Her father, Charles Edward Gabain was a well off French coffee importer and on his retirement he moved the family to England to The Manor House, Bushey, Hertfordshire.

She knew the country and was able to speak fluent English due to the fact, from the age of fourteen, she had boarded at Wycombe Abbey School, Buckinghamshire.

The school encouraged her art skills and commissioned her to paint a portrait of Miss Ann Watt Whitelaw, who was the headmistress there from 1911 to 1925.

[6] The Central, which was established in 1896 by the London County Council, offered instruction in the trades which were thought to be more artistic – lithography being one of them.

Gabain experimented with colour lithography and decided it was not how she wanted to work so she sought to produce brilliant rich black and white lithographs.

[7] In 1910, Gabain and her future husband John Copley, along with A.S Hartrick and Joseph Pennell, were among the founding members of the Senefelder Club.

When the Club held its first exhibition at the Goupil Gallery in January that year,[1] six lithographs by Gabain were included.

During the two and a half years they were there, Gabain painted the landscape and gave art classes and public lectures at the Alassio English School.

Pierrot was based upon the character portrayed by Jean-Gaspard Deburau, a poignant, passionate and tragic person who plays the role of a sad clown madly in love with Columbine, a beautiful, young ballet dancer.

[9] In 1924, Gabain received a commission for nine lithographs for The Warden by Anthony Trollope, and this was published by Elkin Mathews and Marrot Ltd., in 1926.

These included Peggy Ashcroft, Edith Evans, Adelaide Stanley, Flora Robson and Lilian Baylis.

[1] In April 1940, Gabain was commissioned by the War Artists' Advisory Committee, WAAC, to produce four lithographs of Women's Voluntary Services members and four on the subject of children being evacuated from London and other cities.

[16][17] Gabain's WAAC commissions allowed her to explore her interest in the innovative medical techniques which were being developed during the war.

After her death her husband, John, organized a memorial exhibition of her paintings and lithographs at the Royal Society of British Artists, Suffolk Street, London.