Ludmila Bognycheva was born in Leningrad, Russia, a city laid out by Peter the Great to rival the great capitols of Europe and which became an important seat of culture and learning. During the war years, she was hidden by her mother while the other children were evacuated to uncertain futures, and this she became an honored citizen who survived the worst the Wehrmacht could through at this baroque city, formerly known as St. Petersburg, the Venice of the North. Bognycheva studied physics and applied mathematics and earned degrees, having her paper published, and for a while pursued a career in science. But she was drawn to the history and the literature of her country, which she learned by heart. Her daughter Katya became an impressionist artist whose work was praised in Europe and the United States, and gradually Bognycheva tried her hand at the brushes and colors her daughter had introduced, and began to paint refined and miniature compositions of a happy life lived in the countryside and the city.