Greece is on fire, Slovenia likes nothing better than to masturbate and army officers in Lithuania spend their time pissing on their unfriendly neighbour Russia.

That is how Europe is officially portrayed by its new masters, who took over the continent on 1 January.

A new artwork, commissioned by the Czech government for its six-month presidency of the EU, was this morning installed in the headquarters of the Council of Ministers in Brussels.

The giant mock plastic board, entitled Entropa, is supposed to contain works of art from all 27 EU member states (for full details in pdf form, click here).

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The creator of Entropa is the Czech artist David Cerny, who famously painted a Soviet tank, meant as a war memorial, pink in 1991.

He was briefly arrested because the Monument to Soviet Tank Crews was still a national cultural monument.

Alexandr Vondra, the deputy Czech prime minister, said: "Sculpture, and art more generally, can speak where words fail.

"In line with the Czech presidency motto, 'A Europe without barriers', we gave the 27 artists the same opportunity to express themselves freely as a proof that, in today's Europe, there is no place for censorship.

"In return, we got an uncommon, yet common, piece of art. I am confident in Europe's open mind and capacity to appreciate such a project."

I should perhaps explain Slovenia's interest in masturbation. Erwin Mrkosek, the artist, depicts Slovenia with the words: "First tourists came here in 1213."

He says these first visitors left an appreciative message in caves in Postojna, meaning Slovenians will sell themselves as visitors because they are descended from foreigners.

"This is a strategy associated with the delight of masturbation; we view the hand we use in autoerotic stimulation as the hand of another," the artist writes.