Roman Biliński was born in Lviv on 15 July 1897 into a wealthy noble family. Since childhood he was interested in art, he received his artistic education in Lviv, Krakow. He studied at the Kyiv Art Institute, then one of the most avant-garde educational institutions in Europe; Kazimir Malevich, among others, worked there. After the outbreak of the October Revolution, he reached Turkey via the Caucasus. He settled in Istanbul, where he worked as a teacher of painting and sculpture. Roman Bilinski presumably spent around fifteen years in this city on the Bosporus.

From 1920 he became a member of the Association of Russian Painters in Constantinople, although he mostly worked in sculpture. It is worth mentioning that Bolesław Cybis was also a member of this union. In 1922, at the first major exhibition of this Union, he presented a sculpture-bio of an artist from Podolia, Dmitry Ismaylovich. Bilinski took an active part in the life of the 'Polish' Istanbul. He is credited with the authorship of the Adam Mickiewicz monument in Adampol (now Polonezköy, a district of Istanbul). In June 1934, he presented his own exhibition - among his works was a bust of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. In the same year, he donated eight of his sculptures to an exhibition in Galatasaray; it is worth mentioning that it was at this exhibition that the well-known Turkish artist Melek Celal also exhibited her work. She was the author of the bust of Bilinski. Anyway, both artists had an excellent relationship with each other. The Pole visited the artist in her large house in the prestigious Moda district.

It is most likely that Roman Bilinski taught at Robert College (now Boğaziçi University) in Istanbul, but this issue demands detailed research. So does the matter of his participation in the restoration work at the Hagia Sophia, to which he was allegedly invited by Kemal Ataturk. Bilinski's involvement in the organisation of the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Art and his related collection of objects from across the Turkish state also demands clarification. Bilinski amassed a significant collection of various objects: from ceramics to carpets. Many of these were housed in his Istanbul flat, where he lived with his partner Claire Duriez. Photographs depicting the interiors of Bilinski's flat have been preserved in the family collection. For a time, the artist lived near the famous Istiklal Street - at Küçük Parmak Kapı 4.

The outbreak of the Second World War took the artist by surprise while he was working in Yugoslavia. It is unclear under what circumstances he later found himself on the Italian peninsula. Some sources state that he joined the Anders Army with the rank of captain. In 1946 he settled in Italy, first in Camogli, and from 1949 he stayed in Bordighera. His third wife was an Italian woman, Marcella Conte. Roman Biliński died of a heart attack on 26 March 1981.

The artist's best-known works from the Istanbul period include portrait sculptures - Janina Wegnerowicz, wife of the Polish Consul General Roman Wegnerowicz, and Mrs Ambassador Stefania Olszowska. The Biliński family's private collection in Italy also includes interesting paintings depicting genre scenes from Adampol, portraits of the villagers of the time.

A monographic exhibition by Turkish artist Melek Celal in 2024 at the Sabanci Museum in Istanbul featured one sculpture by her - it was a bronze bust of Roman Bilinski. The sculpture is currently in the collection of the Mimar Sinan Academy of Fine Arts' Museum of Painting and Sculpture (ref. 12/887). In addition, a portrait of Bilinski made by Celal in pencil on paper and several postcards sent to her by the Polish artist were also on show.