Artist's works found after being taken from studio in 1970s

Twenty paintings by the Caribbean British abstract painter Winston Branch have been recovered after they disappeared without trace nearly five decades ago.

- Dalya Alberge

"Those works were stolen from his studio because he wasn't able to pay the rent back in the 1970s," said Varvara Roza, his agent. "This is shocking, isn't it?"

Branch, 78, is now represented in the Tate, the British Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum, among other public collections. Collectors have paid more than £400,000 for his paintings, while his auction record is about £240,000, the price reached in 2023 at Christie's London for The Magic Is in You, a shimmering abstract painting that recalls Monet's Nymphéas.