Museum floor covered in peanut butter

More than 800 pounds of peanut butter — enough for around 15,000 sandwiches — was spread across the floor of a museum in the Netherlands in tribute to Dutch artist Wim T. Schippers, who died last month.

The conceptual artist, who was 83, first created the Pindakaasvloer, or peanut butter floor, in 1969. The work was unveiled at the Depot offshoot of Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in the Dutch port city of Rotterdam for a two-month show.

Schippers was a beloved non-conformist character in the Netherlands, where he also voiced Ernie and Kermit the Frog in the Dutch version of Sesame Street, and created absurdist and silly works that challenged conventional ideas about the meaning of art.

Schippers created the work as part of a Floor Covering Series, which also included floors covered with glass shards and salt. The aroma, redolent of breakfasts and lunch boxes, is what lingers with many who experience the work first hand. Museum staff directed visitors for the opening to “follow the smell” which was wafting by the ticket counter, three floors below where the artwork is laid out.