This watercolor on canvas entitled “Gabriella” is a striking example of Pascin’s distinctive talent for rendering the female form in a completely unique and yet archetypically Modern way. The woman depicted seems caught off guard in a moment of intimacy, laying on a swirling gray background painted in a gestural manner with delicate washes of color. The imperfect outlines of the subject’s fleshy form make her seem unreal, like she is lost in a soft dream, and her sensual expression conveys an innate eroticism, as does her partially nude body, splayed out to confront the male gaze.

Leading Modern artist Jules Pascin (1885-1930) is known for his beautiful, pastel-colored nudes. Born in Vidin, Bulgaria, he studied painting in Vienna in the early 1900s and in Munich at the Hetmann Art School. There he worked as an illustrator for the satirical newspaper Simplicissimus. In 1905, he moved to Paris and became one of the leading artists of the Ecole de Paris. In 1907, Pascin had his first solo exhibition at Paul Cassirer Gallery in Berlin, followed by several others in the German capital. In 1912, he exhibited in Cologne Sonderbund-Ausstellung and in 1913 in the Armory Show in New York, and in Paris in the Salon d’Automne, Salon des Indépendants and Galerie Berthe Weil.

Fleeing to New York in 1914 to avoid being drafted in the Bulgarian army, Pascin met John Quinn, an important American collector. Pascin became an American citizen in 1920 and had his first solo exhibition in the U.S. at Berlin Photographic Company in New York the same year. In 1923, he exhibited at Joseph Brummer Galeries in New York and in Knoedler Galleries, New York in 1930. The artist’s lifelong battle with depression and alcoholism culminated that same year however: on June 2 in Paris Pascin committed suicide at the age of 45.