At some point – quietly, without ceremony and certainly at no one's urgent request – Zac Efron morphed from a fibreglass facsimile of matinee-idol perfection circa 1957 into rather a good actor.
Frank Sidebottom, resplendent in a fibreglass head, shuffled onto the 80s pop scene like a postmodern riff on George Formby or Norman Wisdom, full of guileless chatter and novelty tunes.
It's no wonder that stepping on to one is like entering an A&E ward: bright orange handrails everywhere, fluorescent strip lighting, baby blue flooring and a fibreglass interior that erupts into mysterious bulges in awkward places.
It's how fibreglass is made, he explains and then drops this demonstration sample into a bin where it later explodes and threatens to catapult across the room.
He is wearing a giant fibreglass head with big blue eyes and a severe parting painted on to it.
This consisted of six huge iron boxes containing fibreglass depictions of scenes from his 81 days in a Chinese prison, complete with guards and cell-beds.
But the ultimate shock or "le clou du spectacle" came in the Hall of Mirrors, where nothing felt so kitsch and rococo as the "Flower Matango", an explosive double sphere in metal, fibreglass and acrylic.
For instance, one work might be made in fibreglass, bronze and stainless steel.
Granted, Jascha Heifetz could make an aluminium fiddle sound beautiful, even played with a fibreglass bow, as he did on concert tours in tropical climates.
At the other end sat a winsome, child-sized fibreglass animal: the whole contraption was motorised.
The show couldn't end on a higher note".Snail", another exhibit, has a fat, coiling fibreglass body which opens out into a lusciously vermilion mouth.
