"Jules Pascin: Important Works".(art exhibit)(Brief Article)

"Jules Pascin: Important Works" at Forum Gallery, New York. February 8-March 10, 2001

That someone would try to revive the reputation of Jules Pascin (1885-1930) is a welcome and not entirely surprising occurrence: both his subject matter and biography well suit him to contemporary tastes. Born Julius Mordecai Pincas, Pascin (an anagram of his last name) led a peripatetic bohemian life textured by sexual adventure and tragedy. He often painted bordello scenes and other louche subjects. In 1920, after six years in New York, he became an American citizen, but he died young in Paris, a suicide. Pascin's reputation has largely been eclipsed by those of other modern painters, and, from the evidence of his recent show, it's not difficult to see why. Make no mistake, Pascin was an accomplished, even virtuosic, painter and a magnificent draughtsman, but he remained stylistically restless and subtle, not given to brash experimentation. His drawings range from wobbly-lined expressionist caricature to deftly shaded and modeled studies to drawings that employ a spare, Matissean line. And his late, "signature" painting style--soft, Renoir-tinged, and watery--likely seemed rather old-fashioned to later generations of painters.

Deftly incorporating strains of the nascent expressionism, the earlier canvases on view were, to my eye, the most satisfying. Portraits from this period, such as La Melancolique (1909) and that of Isaac Grunewald (1911) balance striking, psychological details--narrowed eyes and a set jaw in the former, a painter's spindly hand, lidded eyes, and distracted mien in the latter--with a somber palette, enlivened in passages by strongly emotional brushwork and patches of brighter colors. One of the finest works on view, Module Devant ...