He went to a junior high school for mathematics and natural sciences in Cieszyn, where he met the poet Julian Przyboś. Beginning in 1933, he studied biology at Jagiellonian University. He was a co-editor for the Nasz Wyraz (Our Word) monthly. He debuted with a short story titled Lighter (Zapalniczka, 1934) published in Zaranie Śląskie and with a poem in Gazeta Artystów (Artist’s Gazette).
He described the atmosphere in which his contemporaries had to make moral choices in a novel titled Gołębia Street (1955). It showcased why it was that leftist views and the avant-garde went hand in hand in his generation.
These connections were evident; they were convinced that all the bravest artistic and literary hopes could only be fulfilled in the form of a government which would overthrow old social conventions and transform capitalist, private institutions into social organs serving the nation, created for its benefit and compliant with its needs.
An interest in contemporary art taught to Filipowicz by Przyboś made him an active figure in the world of the avant-garde at that time. He got acquainted with the members of Grupa Krakowska and Cricot Theatre.
After the September Campaign, he fled from imprisonment and worked as an official in a quarry in Zagnańsk, an antique shop in Kraków, and an architectural office. He conspired in Ignacy Fik’s Polish People’s group. He published ten copies of a tome of poems titled Passed By (‘Mijani’) in 1943. After being arrested by the Gestapo in April 1944, he was imprisoned in Groß-Rosen and Sachsenhausen concentration camps.
After the war, he moved to Kraków and married the visual artist Maria Jaremianka (1908-1958). His debut in prose – Serene Landscape (1947) – won him the Literary Award of the City of Kraków. He worked with literary magazines such as Odrodzenie, Dziennik Literacki, Życie Literackie, Tygodnik Powszechny, and Odra. In 1964, he got married for the second time to Maria Próchnicka, an art historian.