Hawksley was born in London, the daughter of an instrument maker and grand-daughter (on her mother’s side) of a marine artist. She studied at the RA Schools (where she was a Landseer scholar and a life painting medallist) and then taught for two years at the Women’s Department of King’s College, London, in Kensington, where Byam Shaw was also on the staff. She exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1904 to 1964 and at the Paris Salon, and was a member of the Society of Mural Decorators and the Society of Painters in Tempera. In the 1920s she evolved a schematic style in watercolour that is highly personal though strongly influenced by Japanese prints and owing much to the early Italian masters and the example of Cayley Robinson.

Watercolour was Hawksley’s favourite medium, with which she evolved a schematic style of ‘flat, unshaded effects’ that is highly personal, though strongly influenced by Japanese prints and the watercolours of her friend, Frederick Cayley Robinson. She used herself, her sister-in-law and a lay figure she nicknamed ‘Enid’ to model. Her work is quiet, feminine in theme and delicate in execution.

The full moon, long associated with feminine cycle, suggests fertility - the future is quite definitely female in this painting.