Kseniyka Smith was born Ksenia Velikolug in Moscow with spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy. Although her controlled mobility is concentrated in one or two fingers of her left hand, she pursued inclinations to write and draw from her earliest years. Her parents raised her to live a life without limitations, and, in any case, her character was such that she wouldn’t have recognized limitations even if someone had attempted to impose them upon her. A chance 1996 meeting with a theater company run by the famed director, writer and educator Boris Yukhananov gave Ksenia new purpose. She soon joined the troupe and, in 2004, was a star performer and writer in an award-winning production titled The Story of an Upright Man. Seated centerstage in her wheelchair before a computer on a raised platform, Ksenia wrote texts ranging from philosophy to jokes that appeared immediately on an overhead screen, and often controlled the course of the performance. In 1999 she published a book about her experiences studying with Yukhananov, Our Theater: A True Story. In 2010 she married an English citizen, hence her very unRussian last name of Smith. The couple traveled extensively in the U.K. and Australia where, being an extremely quick learner, Ksenia became fluent in English. Ksenia is a computer artist and sells her work online via Facebook. She mounted a solo exhibit of her paintings, The Life in Me, in 2019 in Moscow. For that exhibit, Ksenia wrote the following biographical blurb: “Virtually paralysed (cerebral palsy), Ksenia leads an active life, writes books, paints on the computer, performs in the theater, was married, attended the Wimbledon tournament and rafted on a ferry down the Nile.”