Anna Golubkina

Anna Semyonovna Golubkina (Russian: Анна Семёновна Голубкина; January 28, 1864 - September 7, 1927) was a Russian impressionist sculptor. As the first Russian sculptor to receive the Paris Salon prize, she is regarded as the first female Russian sculptor of note. Golubkina also had an exhibition at the prestigious Alexander III Museum. A crater on Venus is named after her.

Golubkina was born in Zaraysk, Ryazan gubernia (currently Moscow Oblast), Russia to a family of peasant Old Believers. Her father died when Golubkina was only two years old. She was raised by her grandfather, Policarp Sidorovich Golubkin, who was a profitable vegetable farmer and probably the head of the local Filippians community.

Golubkina did not receive even a primary school education until the age of 25. Despite their total lack of formal schooling, all the children in Golubkin's family were literate and Golubkina's older sister Alexandra later got a nurse (feldsher) diploma. Golubkima's talents in painting and sculpture were discovered by the local art teacher, who recommended that she go to Moscow to study art.

In 1889 she took entrance exams for Otto Gunst's Classes for Elegant Arts, an architecture school. Having no formal education, she failed some exams; but an examiner, sculptor Sergey Volnukhin, challenged other examiners to name a sculptor able to produce anything like her 'Praying old woman'. He convinced them not only to admit Golubkina, but to waive her tuition as well.

The next year, the school closed due to bankruptcy. Anna entered the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture where she studied from 1890-1894 under Professor Sergey Ivanov. One of her classmates was another famous sculptor Sergey Konenkov.

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