Jules Pascin was a larger-than-life artist who defied easy categorisation. The Bulgarian-born, Viennese-trained artist moved to Paris in 1905 and quickly fell into influential circles, showing his paintings and prints in the Salon des Indépendants and satellite exhibitions of the Berlin Secession. Though most often remembered for his delicately-toned, thinly-painted studies of performers and prostitutes in various stages of undress, Pascin also depicted the villages and cafés of his surroundings in denser Cubist and German Expressionist styles.

When the Great War broke out in 1914, the 29-year-old Pascin relocated to the United States with the assistance of his friend and famed photographer, Alfred Stieglitz, and remained there until 1920. He began his American sojourn in New York, yet quickly became disenchanted with the harshness and near-vulgarity of northern cities and fled to the gentler American South. While in the United States, Pascin all but forwent oil painting in favour of ink drawings with gouache and watercolour overlaid, as exemplified by the present work of two men sharing a drink. In Les Buveurs, Pascin astutely articulates the patterns of the scene – the various textures of the men’s silken top hats and starched suits can be read through a patchwork of varied pigment-stained crosshatching. Pascin interweaves planes and lines in muted tones of blacks, greys, and ochres to create an outstanding example from the artist’s brief foray into the Cubist style, which he would abandon later that year.