Ferry Pilots by Ethel Gabain, lithograph

Ethel Gabain produced two Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA) subjects for her Official War Artist commission about ‘women doing men’s work in wartime’. In this work she represents female pilots departing from Hatfield aerodrome in a Tiger Moth.

ATAs delivered aircraft to nationwide airfields without full combat training, progressing from biplanes, such as the Tiger Moth (delivered to trainee pilots), to heavy bombers. A painter and pioneer of British lithography, Gabain received various short-term contracts to represent the war effort. Her lithographs were so admired that their publication in large editions, for British and American audiences, was supported during wartime paper rationing and as an exception to the ban on ‘luxury printing’ and to her usually modest edition sizes. From the Air Ministry allocation of works from the War Artists' Advisory Committee, 1947. Original accession number: LD1533. On loan from the RAF Air Historical Branch (MOD). Copyright: Crown (expired) / RAF Museum.