On 10 January 1850, in the small village of Limouziniere, south of Nantes, a son, Józef Paweł Wiktor, was born into the family of Polish émigré Florentyn Ignacy Zarzecki. He spent his childhood and early youth in France, then went to study art in Warsaw, where he studied under Wojciech Gerson. He continued his studies at the famous Munich Academy. From 1873 to 1883 he stayed in Bavaria, learning more about German art. This period was characterised by the assimilation of local artistic techniques and works on sacred themes. In 1883 he began travelling to southern Europe. He reached Austria and Romania.

In the same year he moved to Istanbul, where he took up a position at the newly established (1882) Academy of Fine Arts. Together with a group of foreign artists, such as: Leonardo de Mango, Salvatore Valeri or Alexander Vallauri, Zarzecki is counted among the most important teachers of painting in the then capital of the Ottoman Empire. He probably then added the name of his father's family coat of arms to his name. Three more members of his family made careers in Turkey. His life's choice was a German woman from Munich, Anna Kitzinger, with whom he had a daughter, Teresa (she married Konstatinos Dimitriadis), who moved to Greece after the First World War. The couple also had a son, Tadeusz, who studied chemical engineering in Switzerland and later settled in France.

Some sources state that he stayed in Istanbul until 1915. Between 1901 and 1903 he participated in the first, second and third Istanbul Salons, presenting paintings with Orientalist themes. The verified information on this artist ends with the Istanbul period. It is not known when exactly he left the Ottoman Empire. Currently, there is no precise information on when and where he died. In some materials, it is possible to find news that he died in 1925, while others point to 1926. There is certainly still a lot of detective work ahead of researchers to establish the biography of this distinguished painter, who contributed to the development of this branch of art in Turkey. He created paintings related to everyday life in Istanbul. He often undertook portrait works. He mainly depicted figures occupying the upper rungs of the local social ladder. His works from the Turkish period are characterised by an orientalism typical of Western artists who found their way to the Middle East under different circumstances.

Varnia Zarzecki's artistic output includes many works that are now mostly in private collections. Only occasionally are they presented at exhibitions or belong to public museum collections. For example, a portrait of Sultan Selim III by Zarzecki is kept in the Pera Museum in Istanbul. In an exhibition depicting panoramas of the city, this museum displayed his painting under the title 'Village Café on the Hills of Dolmabahçe'. The painting, executed in oil on canvas, dates from the early twentieth century. It depicts a pair of young people hanging out in one of Istanbul's many cafes, which offers a magnificent view of the city. The man in a fez, seated at a table, is by no means drinking coffee or tea. There are mugs of beer on the table. His long-haired companion, dressed in a light-coloured dress, stands leaning against a tree and, although facing the Bosphorus, turns her face towards the man. Numerous ships pass through the strait. It is easy to recognise that the scene being portrayed was most likely set near where the Swisshotel is now located, as indicated by the visible minarets of the Dolmabahçe Mosque and a section of the clock tower. The painting is in the Orientalist painting collection of the Suny and İnan Kıraç Foundation, inventory number 269.