“He [Yue Minjun] has his face in all his artwork, this is his theme,” said Ruthin School’s newly-appointed headteacher Frances King.
“And what he’s doing, is asking you to stop, think, laugh, be amused, but maybe also step out of yourself and try to understand what you are doing in the time and the moment that you see it.”
Mrs King said the reaction to the inflatable had been “tremendous”, with people stopping, laughing and sometimes being “slightly outraged”.
But, she believes, it has also served the new arts festival well.
“The whole point… was to take art outside the gallery, into common spaces and make you interact with the space, with the world around you, with the piece of art,” she said.
Although not set to become a permanent fixture, the grinning giant has left some locals feeling a little deflated.