Surrealist artist Henry Orlik feels ‘violated’ over missing works

A rediscovered surrealist artist who has had dozens of his works go missing says it has left him feeling violated.

Henry Orlik, 78, was evicted from his social housing flat in London in 2022 while he was recovering from a stroke in hospital, which is when the paintings disappeared.

Now living back in his childhood home in Swindon, his work there is being carefully catalogued and some of it has been sold in exhibitions, altogether making more than £2m.

Usually reclusive and recently recovering from illness, Orlik has only recently felt well enough to give interviews. He said after realising the paintings were gone, “you feel violated”, adding: “I feel physically sick.”

Orlik rose to fame in the 1970s before deciding to leave the art world.

For decades the artist worked away in his flat, stacking and rolling up canvases and drawings.

But in the past couple of years he has made a comeback, with his art selling for millions and featuring in private galleries in London and New York.

Orlik has already put up a £50,000 reward to find all the paintings, but they have yet to appear.

The work represents years of the artist’s life.

“The titles aren’t important, but I remember them. I worked on them for a long time. They’re in me,” he said.

“There’s meaning behind an image. That’s why I painted it, there’s a reason.”

After discovering they were gone, he said: “You feel violated. I feel physically sick because it’s something unusual, not real.”

He said getting them back would mean everything.

His surrealist work is unusual and many of the paintings, some of which are huge, would have taken months to complete.

Orlik uses tiny brush strokes, with much of his work made up of small squiggles he calls excitations. It is also very precise and accurate.

Art dealer and expert Grant Ford, who has the missing pieces listed on his website, said some were “iconic”.

“There’s a picture of Marilyn Monroe, which is very beautiful. There’s a picture of a cowboy. Many of these pictures that have gone missing by Henry are just brilliant. They’re icons.”

After selling his paintings over the past 18 months in London, New York and in Marlborough, Wiltshire, Orlik now has his first solo exhibition in a publicly funded gallery.

Some of those who have already bought his work have loaned it out to the exhibition at Museum and Art Swindon.

One of those is Helen Michael, who calls the piece she bought “very emotional”.

“The colours, the detail, the imagination, I could look at it for a very long time. You just think, how how did he do this?”

While initially it was thought there were about 78 missing artworks, a re-count has found it likely to be a much higher number.

Orlik is pleased his work is getting more appreciation, but finding his missing paintings is what is most important to him.