Josef Platzer was a painter and stage designer, the son of sculptor IF Platzer.

During his high school studies in Prague, he studied drawing with the painter F. Wolf and with the help of Count Kounice he got to Vienna. From 1774 to 1778 he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, where he became famous as a set designer for Gluck's operas staged by the Burgtheater. In 1781, he was invited to Prague and created twelve stage decorations for the Nostic Theater, in which probably all local productions were performed, including the premiere of Mozart's Don Giovanni. From 1786 he lived mostly in Vienna.