Bilinska-Bohdanowicz, Anna |
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BORN 8 Dec 1854, Zlatopol, Kherson - DIED 18 Apr 1893, Warsaw CAUSE OF DEATH heart attack GRAVE LOCATION Warszawa: Cmentarz Powazkowski, Ulica Powazkowska 14 (010 - 01 - 18) |
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Anna Bilinska was born in Zlatopol, then part of the Russian Empire and now in Ukraine. Her father was a Polish physician. After the family moved to Central Russia, Ignacy Jasinski and Michal Elwiro Andriolli taught her art. Both had been deported to Vyatka after they took part in the uprising of 1863/1864. In 1875 she moved to Warsaw with her family. Anna was a promising pianist, but she preferred painting. In 1876 Wojciech Gerson became her teacher at his private painting school. She exhibited her work at Towarzystwo Zachety Sztuk Pieknych (Warsaw's Zacheta Society for the Promotion of Fine Arts). Despite the objections of her parents, she rented a studio at Nowy Swiat Street where she sold her paintings and paid the rent herself. In 1882 she travelled with her chronically ill friend Klementyna Krassowska to Munich, Salzburg, and Vienna. In Vienna she met Wojciech Grabowski. They fell in love and were secretly engaged. She continued to northern Italy and then to Paris, where she studied at the Académie Julian. Marie Bashkirtseff and Emmeline Deane were her fellow artists and Emmeline painted her. In 1884 both her father and Klementyna died. It hit her hard, but she was financially secure because Klementyna had proved for her. In 1885 her fiancée Wojciech Grabowski (b.1850) died as well. He had suffered from tuberculosis and lived in Lviv. She spent several months with her friend the painter Maria Gazycz (1860-1935) in Normandy to recover. She went to Warsaw in 1886 for a while but returned to Paris where she rented a studio on the rue de Fleurus. From 1886 to 1892 she worked as a tutor at the Académie Julian. In 1889 her self-portrait for the Exposition Universelle earned her a silver medal. It had also won her a gold medal at the Salon in 1887 and it brought her international fame. In 1889 she exhibited at the Royal Academy of Art in London and in 1891 in Berlin. She left France in 1892 after she married the Doctor of Medicine Antoni Bohdanowicz. They settled in Warsaw. There she was planning to open an art school for women, but heart problems prevented her from realizing her plan. She was one of the artists commissioned by Ignacy Korwin-Milewski to paint a self-portrait in 1892, but hers remained unfinished. She died on 18 April 1893 of a heart attack, and she was buried at Cmentarz Powazkowski in Warsaw. Related persons • knew Bashkirtseff, Maria |
| Images | ||
 The grave of Anna Bilinska-Bohdanowicz at Cmentarz Powazkowski in Warsaw. Picture by Androom (13 Sep 2026) |
 The grave of Anna Bilinska-Bohdanowicz at Cmentarz Powazkowski in Warsaw. Picture by Androom (13 Sep 2026) |
 "Portrait of a Young Woman with a Rose in her Hand". (1892, Warsaw: National Museum) |
Sources • Anna Biliáska - Wikipedia (EN) |
