Henry Orlik: The ‘great’ artist recluse and his 78 missing paintings

For the untrained eye, the first thing you might notice about Orlik’s work is how precise it all is. Some of it feels quite science-fiction.

Mr Ford explained that Orlik has always had a strong interest in physics, and it shows.

He uses tiny squiggles on the paintings that make up the colours, which he calls “excitations”.

Friend Mr Pietruska said to create the effect, Orlik would sometimes use just a couple of hairs on a paintbrush at a time on each one, which could take huge amounts of time.

First training at the Swindon College of Art as a contemporary of Gilbert O’Sullivan and Virgin Atlantic logo designer Ken White, Orlik also went to Cheltenham School of Art.

Mr Pietruska is glad his friend is finally getting recognition.

“It’s just a little old Swindon fella who’s made really good,” he said.

“I’m happy to be able to see that I’ve been able to discover these things.”

But for all the skill on display, dozens of his pieces of work vanished in a key period while he was in hospital.

The hunt begins to attempt to track down what might have happened to them.