[2] At age 11, Artur Grottger was sent from a quiet estate to study painting in Lwów under the apprenticeship of Jan Kanty Maszkowski (1848–1852), (together with Stanisław Tarnowski)[3] and (briefly) Juliusz Kossak.

While in Austria, he travelled to Munich, Venice and to Hungary, where he met his biggest future sponsor and benefactor, Count Aleksander Pappenheim.

During his stay in occupied Poland, he poured all of his talent and energy into depicting the hopes and horrors of the failed Polish insurrections in several series of black-and-while panels including Warszawa, Polonia, Lithuania and Wojna (1863–1867) which brought him no income.

The series titled "Polonia" included eight boards, depicting the grim realities of everyday life and struggle under Russian occupation.

In 1908, Ignacy Jan Paderewski, whose own father had been caught up in the insurrection and had been arrested, completed his magnum opus, the Symphony in B minor "Polonia", which was inspired by Grottger's series of paintings.