What is up with the Dutch painting everything they can get their hands on blue? It’s like their favourite thing; They can’t get enough of it. Anyway, I love them dearly because their art is just so gloriously freakishly random and Hofman is no different. He just seems to have the power to take seemingly ludicrous and all-together quite possibly pointless idea bubbles and convert them into reality. For this I admire him to no end. Case in point: 2007’s “Rubber Duck”.

He floated a gigantic rubber duck down the Loire River in France. By gigantic, I mean this fucker is 26 metres tall. That’s 85 feet. Plus the artist’s description on his site basically fills me with glee: “People have gathered and watch in amazement as a giant yellow Rubber Duck approaches. The spectators are greeted by the duck, which slowly nods its head. The Rubber Duck knows no frontiers, it doesn’t discriminate people and doesn’t have a political connotation.” So true – if you’re weary of the whole Obama vs. Hillary debate, just look to the duck!

In 2006, Hofman also gave the world “Signpost 5”. A celebration for the the 5th anniversary of the Schiermonnikoog Chamber Music Festival (I wish I was making that up, but I’m not – you read it right, Schiermonnikoog bitches…), he envisioned a series of three huge grand pianos washed up onto the shore. Lucky beachcombers could then explore, climb about, picnic on, or even sleep inside the beached pianos.

I think we can all agree that his pièce de résistance, however, is 2004’s “Musk Rat”. Simply, he built a 12 metre tall thatched musk rat reclining against a life-sized cottage. Why? Why the hell not! The musk rat is lampin’, y’all. Only in the Netherlands…