Guy Brown Wiser was born on February 10, 1895 in Marion, Indiana. Wiser was a graduate of Cornell University in 1917. He served in the Air Force as a pilot in World War I. After the war he returned to Indiana where he worked for several years as an architect.

Wiser traveled to Paris, and in 1924, he became a student of Jean Despujols. He stayed in Paris for almost two years and when he returned to the United States, he studied in Cape Cod with Charles Hawthorne. Later he attended art classes at Ohio State University.

In 1934 he moved to Los Angeles and taught at Scripps College for two years. Between 1935 and 1957 he illustrated close to 80 books for different publishing companies. Wiser’s figurative paintings of the 1930s are reminiscent of his teacher Jean Despujols; they often depict the utopian images found in the Art Deco paintings of the artists of Bordeaux. His paintings combine classical technique, and his subjects are displayed with lyrical symbolism.

Wiser exhibited at the Painters and Sculptors of Los Angeles exhibition in 1935 and also at the Academy of Western Painters in 1936.

Wiser died in Fallbrook, CA, on March 30, 1983.