Antonina Rzhevskaya

Antonina Leonardovna Popova was born on 1861 in Shalepnyky, Tver Governorate, Russian Empire; to a family of impoverished noble landowners.

She also took private lessons from Nikolai Avenirovich Martynov, set up a studio on a small street and began exhibiting in 1890.

She was married to Nikolai Fyodorovich Rzhevsky, who taught at a private girls' school and was a member of the "Imperial Russian Technical Society".

At the beginning of World War I, she moved to Tarusa to live with her daughter and new son-in-law, Vasily Vatagin, who would later become a well-known sculptor and animal artist.

[1] In 1920, together with Nikolay Kasatkin, she organized an educational art studio for children who were ill with bone disease and did volunteer work at the Zakhar'in sanatorium, near Khimki, where she also painted frescoes.