Martin B. Leisser

Born to German immigrant parents, Leisser was raised in Pittsburgh. Leisser saved earnings from a job as a decorative painter to travel to Paris and Munich for art study in the late 1860s. He returned to Pittsburgh where he taught at the Pittsburgh School of Design for Women and began to associate with the Scalp Level School of painters. Despite long trips abroad, Leisser remained at the heart of the Pittsburgh art scene, becoming headmaster of the Pittsburgh Art School and a founder of the Pittsburgh Art Society.