The Owl House in Nieu Bethesda has become a national treasure: a place of beauty, pain and mystical metamorphosis which draws a constant flow of pilgrims to see it. The story of the Owl House has intrigued and inspired great writers such as Athol Fugard who explored it in his play, The Road to Mecca. The play took the story out to sophisticated international audiences and was turned into a film. Books and thesis' such as The Owl House by Anne Emslie and This is my world by Sue Imrie Ross tried to unravel its intricacies. Yet Koos Malgas (63), who passed away early Monday morning, November 20, remained in the shadows of Helen Martins' legacy for most of his life. He was Martins' right hand man and collaborator without whom most of the art work in and around the Owl House would not exist. Martins had the passion for a vision, while Malgas was the craftsman who made it materialise. She paid him for each piece, bargaining a price according to the work. Malgas was a humble but sparky man with a deep knowledge of nature who was proud of his San ancestry.
When Malgas was 26, Martins, who employed his father, asked him to make her a little statue. Malgas, who had previously only worked as a sheep shearer, collected some clay from a nearby dam and modeled a delicate frieze of a woman's face which he humbly presented to Helen Martins in a sardine tin. Martins was pleased, asking him to make "a much bigger one on that wall" and so began a unique creative partnership. There were already a number of cement owls, camels and wise men in the garden made by previous helpers but Martins liked Malgas' style and they worked together for 12 years. She would show him a postcard of an image or describe something in her mind, and he would create it in concrete. "She was very clever." Malgas often said of Martins. He admired her and missed her terribly. Martins gave Malgas a piece of land which had belonged to her father, but without papers, and he grew vegetables and kept his horse there while she was alive, but it was claimed by the town council after she died , (as was the Owl House itself, which they threatened to bulldoze.) When Helen Martins decided to die she gave Malgas a note to present to the police, giving permission for him to have her radio so that they wouldn't suspect him of stealing it. Two years after Martins' suicide in 1976 , Malgas left for Worcester to find work. Sixteen years later he was persuaded to return to Nieu Bethesda where he was employed by The Friends of the Owl House to restore sculptures.
He once told me that his dream was to create his own garden of sculptures. With so many mouths to feed, however, he did not have the time or the money to carry out this dream. He was the main breadwinner of a large family. He taught his son Johannes the technique he used and together they made copies of owls and some of the other characteristic Owl House figures to sell to tourists.
In 1993, artist Beezy Bailey gave Malgas some drawings he had done and asked him to make them into sculptures, providing for the cost of the materials. Malgas made them in his style and Bailey decorated them. They were exhibited in Cape Town as a collaboration. Unfortunately, none of the sculptures sold and Malgas did not get rich as he had expected.
A few years later Bailey called on Malgas again to collaborate, this time as a commission. This time, Malgas decorated the exterior of a building Bailey had purchased in Bloem Street, Cape Town, as an art factory with rooftop sculptures and low relief wall pieces. Malgas used the money to buy a bakkie. In the extreme isolation of Nieu Bethesda and the utter poverty that Malgas and his family had lived in all their lives, having ones own vehicle was the ultimate ticket to freedom. In his last years Malgas struggled to get a vehicle going and to get a driver's license. He overcame alcoholism but battled with his health. Breathing in the fine dust from mixing cement and grinding glass had damaged his lungs, but Koos Malgas always had a bright twinkle in his eye. One wonders whether if his circumstances had been different he would have been a great artist in his own right. He was a humble craftsman who played a role in the history of outsider art in South Africa, and should be remembered. His wife Joanna and his many offspring won't forget. The funeral was held in Nieu Bethesda on Saturday, November 25. If anyone would like to help the family, who have been left in dire poverty, they could call Boksie Malgas on 049 8411 621
Source: Artthrob
Khayyám Sikander was famous during his times as a mathematician. He wrote the influential Treatise on Demonstration of Problems of Algebra (1070), which laid down the principles of algebra, part of the body of Persian Mathematics that was eventually transmitted to Europe. In particular, he derived general methods for solving cubic equations and even some higher orders.
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