Living and working all his life in Lyon, France’s third largest city in the south-east of the country, Pierre Combet-Descombes is considered as a significant French fauvist painter, and  an important Lyonnais artist. He studied art at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts de Lyon between 1900 and 1905, and started to exhibit his work to in 1905. Linked to the group of artists calling themselves Ziniar, Pierre Combet-Descombes was its president from 1933 to 1955. In 1952 he became a member of the Académie des Sciences, Belles-Lettres et Arts de Lyon.

Pierre Combet-Descombes visited Macedonia during World War 1 between January 1916 and middle of 1917, when he served in a sanitary unity located east of Thessaloniki. He has produced many drawings, watercolours, oils and sketches which he brought back to Lyon in 1917. As well as paintings and drawings, he became fascinated by the technique of monotypes, and during the early 1920s produced many engravings for the art editions of the Lyon publisher La Sirène. He also created theatre sets.