Dowman's brace helped send Arsenal through at Portman Road, with 17-year-old centre-back Marli Salmon also impressing on the night as the club's youngsters outshone several senior teammates, though there were strong contributions too from Martin Zubimendi, Noni Madueke and Mikel Merino.
Speaking afterwards, Arteta could not hide his satisfaction at the manner of the performance.
"I'm really pleased with a lot of things that we've done tonight," Arteta said. "The way we attacked the game, how dominant, fluent and aggressive we were right from the beginning. We scored two very early goals that gave us a great platform for the game, and individually some big performances as well, some debuts tonight which is great to see."
The Arsenal boss drew a direct line between Dowman's underwhelming surface conditions during a recent away trip to Mansfield and his continued ability to produce moments of quality regardless of circumstance.
"That's something very natural for him, and he can deliver those actions effortlessly, I would say. That's his biggest quality," Arteta said, also highlighting the teenager's pressing for the second goal.
"Defensively, his application, his capacity to sustain the actions, which is not easy... he's coping better and better and better."
Asked how he intends to manage the inevitable hype building around a 16-year-old capable of producing performances like Tuesday's, Arteta was clear that protecting Dowman remains the priority.
"We really need to make sure every time we throw him in, he's in the right context with the right preparation," Arteta said. "We want to make sure that when we just throw him there, he's ready to handle that at every level. It's not just that he can run past somebody. There's a lot more things that we need to look after him."
Arteta also spoke warmly of the wider group missing from the side that won at Sunderland, with Jurrien Timber, Ben White and Piero Hincapié all unavailable ahead of Saturday's trip to Brighton, leaving the manager with selection questions over his defensive depth. On a personal level, though, he admitted the emergence of two teenagers capable of performing at this level offered a rare source of satisfaction.
"Just having two 16-year-olds playing for Arsenal at this level against a Premier League team is so fulfilling," he said. "Medium and long term, we know that if they continue to develop in the way that they are, we're going to have two tremendous footballers for the future."
Merino, too, earned praise for his continued development under Arteta, with the head coach describing him as "one of the most intelligent players" he has worked with, adding that his leadership and voice within the squad "has to increase" as his all-round game continues to grow.