Waclaw Borowski was born on August 6, 1885 in Lódz, Poland, into a family of intellectuals, the son of Hipolit and Julia Garbolewska. After completing his secondary education, he entered the Krakow Academy of Fine Arts, where he studied painting under Józef Mehoffer between 1905 and 1909.

From 1909 to 1913, he lived in Paris. He copied the works of the Old Masters in the Louvre and immersed himself in Renaissance art before traveling to Italy. Between 1914 and 1919, he lived in Switzerland. A major artist of Polish classicism in the 1920s and 1930s, Borowski was co-founder and active member (1922-1932) of the Association of Polish Artists "Rytm", where he promoted a neoclassical aesthetic inspired by the Italian Quattrocent...