The paintings and sketches were dumped, left for the refuse collectors to take away and consign forever to history – but luckily, one binman had an eye for fine art.

Dozens of drawings by the noted artist Hilda Goldwag, a Jewish refugee from the Nazis who made Scotland her home, has been saved from oblivion by the eager eye of an anonymous binman and a gallery owner who recognised the apparent trash as artistic treasure.

Goldwag, who died in 2008 aged 95 and whose family perished in the Holocaust, enjoyed critical acclaim for her paintings of urban Glasgow of the mid to late 20th century.

The Hidden Lane Gallery in Argyle Street, Glasgow, showed an exhibition of her work in 2010, which, Joe Mulholland, the gallery owner, said generated "considerable interest".During the show, one these interested parties was a dustbin man who, when emptying the bins at the block of flats in the Knightswood area where she lived, found binbags fill of sketch books and individual drawings.

Rather than being consigned to the dump, the binman realised they were by Goldwag and took them into the gallery, along with palette knives and scrapers.

Mr Mulholland found the sketches were studies for later paintings, or "fine drawings that were able to stand by themselves".

Now the works are part of a exhibition at the gallery which runs until the end of next month.

"The gallery gave him a very substantial 'reward' for his foresight and appreciation – but he wanted no personal recognition for saving the works," Mr Mulholland said.

The binman himself will not make himself known: he fears losing his job for saving works from the bins that would otherwise have been taken to the council dump.

Mr Mulholland said it seemed that in the winding up of Goldwag's estate, the sketches were regarded as worthless and thrown away by her lawyers.

"Without the perceptive and appreciative interest of the dustbin man from the 'Clennie', these great drawings would have been lost forever," he said.

The works include those in ballpoint on paper, crayon and pastel on paper, oil on canvas as well as board.

A further 60 to 80 good quality sketches remain as yet unshown.

"Really, the collection itself is so remarkable in itself, but if there was one work I would pick out it is Mother and Child, the pencil-on-paper image we use for the front of the catalogue. It really is a haunting image, a kind of pieta, and so much of her work is embued with sadness," Mr Mulholland said.

"The binman feared he would lose his job so he will not be identified, but thanks to him these works have been saved."

The sketches are priced between £125 and £275.

One last misfortune struck the collection before the exhibition at the Hidden Lane Gallery opened at the end of March: one of the key works was stolen by an opportunistic thief.

The paintings and sketches were ready to be hung when someone stole a Portrait of a Woman, an oil on board work, a work worth £1000 which has now been reported to the police.

Goldwag was seen frequently in the areas where she lived and worked, packing paint, board and easel on a shopping trolley, and carrying her work on buses when she made trips to the countryside near Torrance and Kirkintilloch.

Her works are in private homes and in public collec- tions, including Strath- clyde University, the Scottish Jewish Archives Centre and the Ben Uri Gallery at the London Jewish Museum of Art.