 In 1886, she made her first illustrations for twenty folk tales collected by Alexander Afanasyev.Although "War of the Mushrooms" (1889) were the only ones published during her lifetime, her work influenced other illustrators such as Ivan Bilibin and Sergey Malyutin.Polenova exhibited her work at the Palace of Fine Arts at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Illinois.