[Photo/Agencies]

Her first collaboration with the company in 1991 made her the first woman to be invited to take part in the Art Car project, following in the footsteps of Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein.

The car has been displayed in major exhibitions around the world.

South Africa was not quick to recognize Mahlangu's talent, though she has had solo exhibitions in Cape Town.

In 2006, however, she was given a presidential award.

In her cramped two-room thatched-roof hut that doubles as a makeshift gallery stands a wooden cabinet displaying some of her many accolades.

"A lot of people have looked at Esther's work as being more on the craft side," says Craig Mark, director of the Melrose Gallery in Johannesburg.

"She hasn't been really recognized in the visual-arts side in South Africa until very recently."

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE