The Owl House.

Tucked away in the Karoo village of Nieu-Bethesda, the Owl House is the visionary, if eccentric, legacy of the late Helen Martins. Following her parents' deaths in 1945, Martins spent three decades transforming her mundane home into a luminous "Mecca" of ground glass and wire. Inside, sun-drenched walls are coated in crushed glass to catch the light; outside, the "Camel Yard" contains over 300 concrete sculptures crafted alongside collaborator Koos Malgas. The yard is a dense, surreal procession of camels, pilgrims, and wide-eyed owls, all oriented toward a mystical East. This pinnacle of South African outsider art provided the inspiration for Athol Fugard’s play *The Road to Mecca* and remains a haunting, deeply personal testament to one woman’s search for light in isolation.