Coke was born in
Southend-on-Sea in Essex in 1897, where her father was a tea exporter. When she was seventeen, Coke entered the
Slade School of Art, where she continued to study throughout the First World War and where she won a prize for figure composition. In 1919 she was elected a member of the
New English Art Club. By the start of World War Two Coke was a popular and well known artist. During the War she received a short-term commission from the
War Artists Advisory Committee to depict the work being performed by women in various services. To this end she spent time with the
Women's Voluntary Service, the
Auxiliary Territorial Service, the
Women's Auxiliary Air Force and also with the
Red Cross. One of her paintings was included in the
Britain at War exhibition at the
Museum of Modern Art in New York which opened in May 1941. By the end of the War, WAAC had acquired eight paintings from Coke. ==References==