He started to experiment with Cubism after his move in 1909 to the Bateau-Lavoir studios, where he met Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, Otto Freundlich and Juan Gris; he was also encouraged by his friendship with the art collector and critic Wilhelm Uhde.

In 1914, at the outbreak of World War I, he was exempted from military service because of his short stature and was committed to work in an airplane factory near Paris.

[1] After producing his first abstract paintings in 1917, Herbin came to the attention of Léonce Rosenberg who, after World War I, made him part of the group centred on his Galerie de l'Effort Moderne and exhibited his work there on several occasions in March 1918 and 1921.

Herbin himself later disowned his landscapes, still lifes and genre scenes of this period, such as Bowls Players (1923; Paris, Musée National d'Art Moderne), in which the objects were depicted as schematized volumes.

[2] During the 2000s, an important series of original Herbin's signed rugs have been realised by Didier Marien from the Boccara Gallery with the agreement of the rights holders.

[3] Those rugs exhibited in France, but also in Moscow, London and New York played a key role in the worldwide rediscovery of Herbin's artistic creations.