Composition monumentale was made in September 1919, the same year that the manifesto of Constructivism was being formulated in Moscow and Malevich was making his Architectones. Herbin kept in touch with Russian ideas through his connections with the Bauhaus. Earlier in the year Herbin had created his Objets monumentaux, huge assemblages of abstract designs on canvases mounted on wood, which lie at the border of painting and sculpture. The present imposing work is one of a group of purely abstract upright compositions which explore architectural forms, in this case garlands, zigzags and ornamental borders. Despite its foundation in abstraction and political ideology, the effect of the painting is far from solemn. The interlocking of colours, such as flesh with grey and cream with chocolate brown, sets up a rhythm as jaunty as a pair of jazz dancers. The eye is constantly being teased between areas of flat colour and the trompe l’oeil swags and triangles which pulsate with the vivid urban life of Paris.