Growing up, Pleissner spent several summers in Wyoming where he sketched from life and developed a lifelong love of the outdoors, fishing, and the western landscape.
[citation needed] He attended the Art Students League of New York from 1922 to 1926, studying under Frank DuMond, and began teaching at the Pratt Institute soon after.
[citation needed] The National Academy of Design awarded him the 1938 Second Hallgarten Prize for South Pass City (Wyoming Ghost Town).
I used to put out a few big washes and then run into and out of the huts where there was a fire and dry it and go out again.”[citation needed] In 1942, Pleissner accepted a commission from the United States Army as a war correspondent on inactive duty employed by Life magazine.
After the war, Pleissner continued to travel to Europe and Wyoming, painting city scenes, landscapes, and sporting subjects.
[2] In the years since his death, Pleissner's work has become quite popular among collectors of American sporting art and other genres of tangible Americana.
Pleissner’s contentment in his surroundings, interest in the world around him, and his satisfaction with his craft are evident in the masterful use of light and color that pervades his paintings.
Then everything will meld together and you will not have this powerful effect of contrast, and a different, softer mood will prevail.”[citation needed] “During the war I got interested in Europe.
More recently we’ve been to Portugal and Ireland.” I went out very early and saw the morning sun coming up and the long shadows it cast across the great walk of the Tuileries.
The gallery shows watercolors and oil paintings from all periods of Pleissner's career, including early renderings, Western landscapes, works from war-torn France and England, and sporting scenes.