Angelina Beloff (Russian 1879-1969)

Angelina Beloff was born in Russia in 1879, where received her earliest training at San Petersburg's Academy of Fine Art, which she entered at nineteen. She pursued a conventional education in the liberal arts, taking up engraving profesionally only when she went to Paris in 1909. She painted several memorable portraits of Mexicans studying in Paris. On a study trip to Bruges, accompanied by Marie Blanchard, Angelina Beloff met Diego Rivera, whom she married. She was of enormous help to him in Paris, enabling him to continue his studies and exerting a considerable though indirect influence on his art and the course it took later in Mexico. She shared Rivera's deprivarions in Paris but came to Mexico in 1932 to make an independent life for herself. A virtuoso portrait painter in the grand tradition of the royal Russian court, she quickly became an admired and respected figure in Mexican art. After giving much of her time to the Department of Public Education, she retired to live quietly in a Mexico City suburb. Her health began to fail and she died in 1969. Before this she was concentrated on easel painting and engraving. She also illustrated many books.