When she was a teenager the Papa family fled persecution by Turks and Albanians in the region and settled in Corfu.

[2] She attended courses in painting in Corfu with Marco Zavitzianos and Konstantinos Parthenis.

She studied at the Athens School of Fine Arts under Nikolaos Lytras, Konstantinos Parthenis and Thomas Thomopoulos.

After graduating she continued to study in Trieste, Milan and Vienna, where she took classes in art history.

She returned to Greece and became a teacher of painting and decorative arts at the Vocational School of Amalieiou Orphanage.