Artemisia Bowden was born in Georgia to Milas and Mary Bowden and attended St. Athanasius’ parish school in Brunswick. She went on to study at St. Augustine’s Normal, Industrial, and Collegiate School in Raleigh, North Carolina and graduated in 1900. She immediately began a career in teaching at a North Carolina parish school in Fayetteville.

In 1902, Bowden was called to the Diocese of West Texas by Bishop James Johnson in order to revive St. Philip’s Mission in San Antonio. Bowden’s task was to take control of and upgrade the Normal and Industrial School associated with the mission, which had begun as an African Methodist Episcopal congregation, with little support beyond Bishop Johnson’s encouragement and, later, the Woman’s Auxiliary of the Diocese of West Texas. The school, which primarily served poor Black girls, became a boarding school under Bowden’s leadership. By 1926, it achieved junior college status.

Bowden used her personal connections within the church and the community to extend the reputation of St. Philip’s College. For many years she carried out the essential educational tasks with small local grants and some aid from The Episcopal Church’s American Church Institute. During the Great Depression, however, she increasingly turned to her civic connections in the Black community and city government to keep St. Philip's afloat. In 1942, after a long campaign, the San Antonio Independent School District incorporated the school as a publicly owned educational institution for Black youth. Bowden continued to direct the College as its dean until she retired in 1954.

Bowden served as president of the San Antonio Metropolitan Council of Negro Women and was founder and president of the city's Negro Business and Professional Women's Club. In 1947, she was named to the Texas Commission on Interracial Relations. She is credited with the introduction of a Black nursing unit in Robert B. Green Hospital, for securing Lindbergh Park for Black residents, and for establishing the East End Settlement House. She is remembered in the community today in the naming of Bowden Elementary School in San Antonio and Bowden Administration Building at St. Philip's College, which now serves a diverse community of students.