A couple caught with 271 Picasso art treasures stashed in their garage are facing up to 10 years in prison after being charged with handing stolen goods.

Pierre Le Guennec, 71, and his wife Danielle, 69, will appear a judge in Grasse, in the south of France, later this month following a criminal investigation.

It began last November when lithographs, cubist paintings, notebooks and a watercolour all worth at least euros 50 million in total were found at their modest home in nearby Mouans-Sartoux.

After Le Guennec travelled to Paris to get the collection valued with a view to selling it, the administrators of Picasso's estate accused him of receiving stolen goods.

But the couple said they were given the works by Picasso’s wife, Jacqueline.

‘Madame gave them to me,’ said Le Guennec.

Le Guennec installed a burglar alarm at Picasso’s luxury villa near Cannes before the artist died in 1973, and said he accepted them as ‘thank you’ gifts.

The legendary artist’s son, Claude Picasso, said that his father was noted for his generosity, but that he always dedicated, dated and signed his gifts, as he knew that some recipients might try to sell the works one day.