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Pincas, Julius
American painter, draughtsman and printmaker of Bulgarian birth, active in France.
He attended secondary school in Vienna, returning in 1901 to Bucharest, where his family had settled, and working briefly in the office of his father’s grain-merchandizing business. He was, however, already becoming passionately interested in drawing, for which he showed precocious talent. At the age of 16 he became the lover of a woman who ran a brothel and was allowed by her to draw the residents. In 1903 he moved to Munich, where he attended the art school run by Moritz Heymann.

Pascin lived in the United States from 1914 to 1920, sitting out World War I. He taught at the Telfair Academy in Savannah, Georgia, associated with the Telfair Art Museum. He and Hermine painted in New York City as well as in Miami, New Orleans and Cuba.

Pascin married Hermine David at City Hall in New York City. The witnesses were Max Weber and Maurice Sterne, friends and painters who both lived in New York. Pascin was granted United States citizenship. Especially after he returned to France, he became the symbol of the Montparnasse artistic community and is more associated with France. Always in his bowler hat, he was a witty presence at Le Dôme Café, Le Jockey Club, and the other haunts of the area’s bohemian society. Pascin made visits to Bulgaria in 1923/1924 and at an uncertain later date.

Pascin struggled with depression and alcoholism. "Driven to the wall by his own legend", according to art critic Gaston Diehl, he committed suicide at the age of 45 on the eve of a prestigious solo show. He slit his wrists and hanged himself in his studio in Montmartre. On the wall he left a message written in blood, to a former lover, Cecile (Lucy) Vidil Krohg. In his last will and testament, Pascin left his estate equally to his wife, Hermine David, and his mistress Lucy Krohg.

On the day of Pascin’s funeral, June 7, 1930, thousands of acquaintances from the artistic community along with dozens of waiters and bartenders from the restaurants and saloons Pascin had frequented, all dressed in black, walked behind his coffin the three miles from his studio at 36 boulevard de Clichy to the Cimetière de Saint-Ouen. A year later, Pascin's family had his remains reinterred at the more prestigious Cimetière de Montparnasse.