Davis was born in London and studied art at the Ridley Art School.[2] She exhibited landscape paintings and painted fans at the Royal Academy in London from 1886 onwards and at the Paris Salon from 1898.[2][1]
In 1914 Davis had a joint exhibition with Charles Conder, another noted fan artist of the time, in New York at the Colnaghi & Obach gallery.[3] In 1919, Davis shared an exhibition, entitled Pictures, Portraits, Fans and Frivolities, with Laura Anning Bell and Constance Rea at the Fine Art Society in London.[3]
Davis also exhibited at the Leicester Galleries, the Grosvenor Gallery and with both the Royal Institute of Oil Painters and the International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers.[3] The Tate holds an example of her painted fans.[4]
In 1889, she had married Edmund Davis, who was knighted in 1927.[2] Edmund Davis had made a fortune from mining in South Africa and when he settled in London, the couple began assembling a substantial art collection that included paintings by Old Masters, such as Canaletto and Rembrandt, plus more contemporary artists including Whistler.[3] The collection was exhibited to the public at the French Gallery in 1915.[5]
Five old-master paintings were stolen from their collection in 1938.[6]
They also commissioned artists, including Charles Conder, to decorate their Holland Park home and also Chilham Castle, which they owned until after Edmund's death in 1939.[7][4] In due course, the Davises donated works from their art collection to the Iziko South African National Gallery and to the Musée du Luxembourg in Paris.[3] They also donated some items to the Tate collection.[5]
