From the mid-1960s until his death in 1977 Vaughan spent more and more time at his cottage in Essex, leaving the monotony of life in Belsize Park. The surrounding landscape became increasingly important as subject matter in his work. Bryan Robertson comments, 'A convinced Freudian, he read R.D. Laing and had a rueful regard for Beckett. He enjoyed the Essex landscape, the flashing light and steely colours' (see exhibition catalogue, Keith Vaughan 1912 - 1977, London, Austin Desmond, 1990, p. 7).