AceShowbiz - A nude painting of "James Bond" legend Sir Sean Connery has been unearthed in his native Scotland - and it's set to go on display at an exhibition. The veteran actor worked as a naked model for art students before his acting career took off, and the newly-discovered work was created in 1951, 11 years before his first outing as 007.

It was painted by artist Rab Webster and was discovered by relatives among a pile of paintings at his home in Selkirk, Scotland following his death last month. Nick Bihel, a relative of Webster, says, "The oil painting was part of a whole load of paintings just stacked on top of each other in a studio he used as a dark room. He never sold or exhibited any of his paintings but it is fairly obvious he was a very talented artist."

"He said Connery treated it just as a job and that he didn't say very much. I have no idea how much the painting of Sean Connery would be worth. At the moment we are just taking stock of the situation but we would like to put them on display in Selkirk in the near future. Obviously some will have to be sold as there are just too many to keep them all."