She studied painting at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the Stefan Batory University in Vilnius under Professor Tymon Niesiolowski. She continued her studies at the Kraków branch of the Academy of Fine Arts in Paris under Professor Józef Pankiewicz. She found herself in England in 1940: she studied for one year at the Glasgow School of Arts in Scotland and for four years at The Courtauld Institute of Art, gaining a 'Bachelor of Arts with Honours' degree (specialisation - 19th century history of European and English art). In addition to oil painting, watercolour, gouache, linocut and pastel, Michalowska specialised in making ceramics and creating paintings from ceramic tiles, which she fired herself in a kiln.

In 1944, the artist had a solo exhibition at the Royal Arcade Art Gallery in London. She took part in group exhibitions at the Kensington Art Gallery in London in 1951 and the same year at the Gallerie Voyelle in Paris. Michalowska emigrated to Canada in 1956. She took a job at Eaton's department store, began teaching evening courses in painting and drawing for adults, and taught interior design and decoration at Ryerson Polytechnical Institute (now Ryerson University). Overcoming prejudice, she travelled with her ceramic works to communist Poland, where she had an exhibition in 1958 in Warsaw at the MDM and in 1961 at the Bristol Hotel. After the exhibition, she donated some of her works to the National Museum in Warsaw. In an interview 'In the country about a Toronto artist', she talked about the difficulties of creating in exile and the impossibility of making a living from art ('Directions').

In 1960, the artist showed her paintings and ceramic works at the International Institute of Metropolitan in Toronto. In 1962, Michalowska exhibited prints, watercolours, gouaches, linocuts and enamels at Upstairs Gallery in Toronto. In 1965, the artist showed 38 enamels and sixteen gouaches at Tygessen Gallery in Toronto. "Over the years, critics have agreed that in enamels the artist has created her own style and achieved perfection. The subject matter is diverse - there are abstractions next to painterly stains, next to luminous drawing" ("Głos Polski"). Positive reviews of the exhibition appeared in the Globe and Mail, The Montreal Star and Arts News and Review.

In 1966, Michalowska had a solo exhibition at the gallery of the Canadian Guild of Crafts, showing enamels and painted porcelain. In the same year, she made two large wall compositions in enamel entitled 'Man and the Four Elements' - commissioned by the Montreal travel agency General Tours. On the occasion of EXPO 67 in Montreal, the artist prepared eleven enamels with a Canadian flower motif and they were displayed in the Chatelaine pavilion 'Man in the Home'. In the same year, she prepared an exhibition in London at The Courtauld Institute of Art. On the occasion of Canada's centenary, Michalowska donated a painting of painted ceramic tiles, inspired by the history of Toronto, to City Hall.

In 1971, the artist had an exhibition at the Royal Ontario Museum where she showed: 50 painted ceramic tile paintings and 36 ceramic works. In Oshawa/Ontario, on the facade of the School of Science and Engineering Technology building, the artist created the school's coat of arms from 64 painted tiles. A series of pen sketches on forest themes were purchased by Abitibi Building Materials and used to advertise the company. In 1974, commissioned by Gordon Jewellers, the artist created a decoration of 130 painted ceramic tiles to adorn the door of the jewellery shop (years later, as a result of renovations, the door disappeared and the artist was unable to find it).

In 1975, Michalowska exhibited her work in the lobby of the University of Toronto. In 2000, the I.J. Paderewski Museum of Polish Exile in the Royal Lazienki Park organised a survey of the artist's work, 'On Tiles Painted', which showcased the artist's ceramics, paintings, drawings and prints. After the exhibition, the works remained in the collection of the National Museum in Warsaw. In 2008, at the Gardiner Museum in Toronto, the artist gave a lecture on the history and technique of painting on ceramic surfaces entitled. 'Visions in Ceramic Colours', combined with a presentation of her own works.

In a kiln that stood in her home atelier, Michalowska prepared and fired enamels with her own hands. She achieved the vivid, intense colour of the painted tiles. In her painting, she referred to folk stylistics, to Etruscan art, most often depicting an Arcadian world in which man coexists with mythical creatures inhabiting forests and gardens. The artist's original achievements include panoramic paintings composed of dozens of glazed tiles. Michalowska's work was perfectly suited to the time of the development of arts and crafts in Canada. The artist's works can be found in collections in Canada, Poland (National Museum, Warsaw), England, France and the United States. The private archive was donated to the Emigration Archives at the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń after the artist's death.

Work in catalogue
Bronisława Michałowska, Flowers, 1989, composition of four tiles, in the collection of Danuta and Andrzej Pawłowski, donated to the Polish Consulate General in Toronto. Six female faces emerge from a thicket of greenery, leaves and flowers. One figure has her breasts bared and is looking ahead, while others have their eyes closed. The white female faces, wrapped in leaves, are perfectly fused with nature; they are probably, according to the artist's intention, elves, the eponymous flowers from which the real flowers, such as are scattered among the leaves, will bloom. Five red, indefinite flowers, with long, fanciful petals, enliven the green with their intense colour. This ceramic painting contains all the elements of the style that characterises Bronka Michałowska: naivety, formal simplification, reference to folklore and mythology, in which fantasy figures coexist with nature. This fabulousness, conjured up in the artist's tiled paintings, shows a joyful world, with elves, satyrs, living in harmony with the people. The artist has managed to achieve an extraordinary intensity of colour. In this work, the greens, reds and whites are pure and saturated, which is a virtue.