It survived a bushfire, neglect and even Mr Sheen regularly being sprayed on it every Christmas in a family home in Lawson.
But little did Jo Frater and her extended family know that the painting in their Honour Avenue home would be worth a million dollars and one day - due to their own generosity - be hanging in The National Gallery of Australia as a "national treasure".
Bullaburra resident Mrs Frater and her family - the Nickls - grew up never knowing that the painting that took centre stage in the family's lounge room was called The Bushwalkers and was by prominent female artist Freda Robertshaw.
When cleaning out her parents home in 2021 after their deaths and the death of her eldest brother, she had planned to give some of the 70 paintings in the family's extensive art collection to an op shop.
But one of her nephews thought his artist friend Ben Quilty should look at them first. They hauled the paintings in a van down to the Southern Highlands.
"When Ben realised what it was, he was beside himself," Mrs Frater told the Gazette.
Mr Quilty rang an art dealer who immediately offered $600,000 for the painting. A valuer then told him it was worth almost a million dollars if restored. Soon after Mr Quilty and the family met with the National Gallery of Australia to discuss a donation.
Dr Nick Mitzevich, the director of the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra came to the family's Christmas gathering and expressed a desire that the national treasure be shared with the country. He agreed to their condition that the artwork be permanently displayed.
They believed it was what their father/grandfather would have wanted.
Even though the money would have come in handy to help all the family and cover some of the cost of her ill brother's care in his Leura nursing home, Mrs Frater said: "It's part of [my family's] legacy, it's what my parents and grandfather would have wanted, and it's bigger than us".
It took nearly 12 months for NGA staff to clean and restore the painting of the effects of "household wear and tear - a fuel stove, kerosene heater, cooking, insect stains, nicotine stains, paint marks and an unknown chemical".
"The paint marks were from my father painting the frame so that it matched the architraves in our home at Lawson."
Mrs Frater suspects the unknown chemical was her mother's overuse of "Mr Sheen [spray] to keep the canvas clean".
During the 1977 bushfires, she said "flames tore up the south side of our family home, no more than 15 metres from the wall where the painting hung". It also survived her brother, Peter, hitting the canvas with a ball - a discovery only confirmed when the NGA found a dint in it.
"It amuses us now to think we never realised the value or importance of this painting that was always part of our family. It was never independently insured and there is no way the home contents insurance held would have ever covered its value."
The painting was originally bought in 1944 - during World War II - for 100 guineas by her grandfather, Joseph Nickl (Snr) and later bequeathed to her parents Joseph and Josie Nickl. All were art lovers.
As well as an artist, Freda Rhoda Robertshaw (1916-1997) was an enthusiastic bushwalker who lived with her brother Geoff at Wentworth Falls in the 1990s.
"It is feasible to think that my grandfather and father knew the artist, as they probably mixed in artistic and Bohemian circles in Sydney's inner west ... and later as [Mountains] bushwalkers."
Her mother loved the painting and always called it Picnickers in Megalong Valley.
Mrs Frater is relieved that after "such a precarious life and history it ...has been restored and is now in the safekeeping of the NGA and will be eternally enjoyed by visitors for many more years to come".
Viewing in Katoomba
The Freda Robertshaw artwork usually is found in the National Gallery but is coming to the Blue Mountains for one day only.
On Wednesday, March 20 the painting is making a special trip to the Blue Mountains Cultural Centre, Katoomba for a private viewing for family, friends and invited guests.
Mrs Frater said it will be the first time her brother Rob will see it in its restored state.
Mrs Frater always found the painting "frightening" as a child, because of the "goblin-like ears" of a young girl in it, who gazed down upon her.
But now restored she sees it in a "different light" - the way her grandfather must have seen it when he first purchased it.
"I now can see the clarity and detail ... and better understand the significance of this work by such a feminist painter, in a male dominated field back in the 1940s."
Blue Mountains City Council, Artistic Program Leader Rilka Oakley said: "We are thrilled to be able to facilitate this private viewing of The Bushwalkers in support of the National Gallery of Australia and the Frater family. We recently partnered with the National Gallery of Australia in their Sharing the Collection initiative and are delighted to continue strengthening our relationship with them."
