She was the daughter of Adam Nowina Boznański, (from a noble Polish family but influenced by positivism to take up work as a railway engineer) and Eugénie née Mondan originally from Valence, France.

[2] Boznańska learned drawing first from her mother who was a teacher in the convent school of Premonstratensians in Imbramowice near Kraków,[3] then with Józef Siedlecki, Kazimierz Pochwalski and Antoni Piotrowski between 1883-6.

[2] Her 1893 Portrait of Paul Nauen obtained her first public success - being awarded the gold medal at the International Exhibition in Vienna the following year.

[5] Boznańska received the French Legion of Honour in 1912, the Golden Laurel of the Polish Academy of Literature in 1936, the Grand Prix at the Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques la Vie Moderne in 1937,[2] and the Order of Polonia Restituta in 1938.

[6] Her paintings can be found in the National Museums in Wrocław, Kraków, Poznań and Warsaw as well as Musée d'Orsay in Paris and Ca' Pesaro – International Gallery of Modern Art in Venice.