Printmaker, graphic designer, painter, and theater set designer Franciszek Wincenty Siedlecki was born in Krakow on July 23, 1867. After his graduation from secondary school, he became a law student at the Jagiellonian University (University of Krakow). He also studied painting at the Academy of Arts in Munich and Academie Colarossi in Paris.

In the early 1910s Siedlecki discovered the theatre for the first time in his hometown Krakow. The year 1908 saw his debut as a decorator in the Town Theatre; he worked on Norwid’s Krakus together with Józef Sosnowski. In the following artistic season he designed the stages for the productions of Balladyna, Lilla Weneda, and Sen srebrny Salomei. In 1909 the director of the Great Theatre in Warsaw offered him a job of decorator, and he accepted the offer. He designed costumes for A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Two years later he was made head of the decorative department a the Unified Theatre. He made the stage decor for Wesele, Taming of the Shrew, and Irydion. He was also famous for being a co-organiser of the Exhibition of Modern Scenic Painting. In the years of 1914-1919 he was in Switzerland, where he made penetrating analyses of Rudolf Steiner’s anthroposophy, and designed stained-glass for Goetheanum. The final fourteen years of his life were devoted exclusively to painting and writing.

In the years of 1921-1930 he collaborated with Warsaw journals as a theater critic. He published his reviews, sketches, and studies in several theater arts publications while also showing his work in a variety of international exhibitions, including oil paintings, drawings, prints, and watercolors. He died after a long illness on October 1, 1934 in Warsaw.

Information gathered from Ewa Zatorska-Salmanowicz's Franciszek Siedlecki's Way to the Theater , 2010, published by Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL & Katolicki Uniwersytet Lubelski Jana Pawła II