Glenna Gardiner remembers the “dull” landscape image from childhood. As a kid she didn’t understand why her dad cared so much about the painting, which he insisted was a Tom Thomson piece. When Gardiner got older, and learned how famous Thomson was, she assumed her dad had been joking about the piece’s origins.

Turns out this is the real thing.

As Gardiner prepares to collect a small jackpot from the now-verified Thomson Sketch for Lake in Algonquin Park at an art auction in Toronto later this month, she recalls the painting’s unusual journey to stardom.

“I inherited it from my father. When he died there was a bunch of paintings leftover, and my sister took what she wanted, and I took the leftovers. This was one of the leftovers,” she said.

Gardiner, a retired nurse, said the painting hung on the wall of her Edmonton home for several years after her father passed away in 2000, but it was eventually relegated to the basement, where it sat in a stack of old paintings.

But things changed when she and a friend re-organized her basement. Her friend, she said, insisted it could be “worth something.”

Gardiner was doubtful, but her friend persisted.

“She kept after me because I didn’t know who to link to to get it evaluated,” she said.

So she gave it to her friend as a birthday gift.

“I sent it to her as a gag and said she was the only person that had been interested and if it was worth anything we’d go on a cruise. I had mailed it down, which I (later) discovered you’re not supposed to do with a good painting.”

Still convinced it was worth something, Gardiner’s friend took the painting to Heffel Fine Art Auction House in Vancouver where its authenticity was quickly verified.

Now in the hands of art experts, it’s expected to sell for $125,000 to $175,000, and that’s a “conservative estimate” according to auction house vice president Robert Heffel.

A renowned Canadian landscape painter, Thomson did the small 18x25 centimetre “sketch” on site at Lake Algonquin in northeastern Ontario in 1912 or 1913, and later produced a larger version, which is now held by the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa.

“Out in the field he would do the oil sketches, and the (larger) canvases were studio works,” said Charlie Hill, a retired curator from the National Gallery of Canada.

Hill said discoveries like this are rare because most of Thomson’s art is now accounted for. However, he thinks it’s likely a few more previously unknown Thomson pieces will surface in the coming years.

“He was very productive during his brief career, so it seems inevitable that sketches will continue to show up,” Hill said.

Heffel had the painting verified by the Canadian Conservation Institute in Ottawa which found that a special paint called “Freeman’s White,” used only by Group of Seven up until 1920, was present in the sketch. Thomson has long been linked to the famous group of Canadian landscape painters.

Joan Murray, former curator for the Art Gallery of Ontario and the foremost expert in Thomson works, also verified the painting. Murray has spent 40 years cataloguing Thomson’s art and speculated the Claremont, Ont., native would be surprised by how famous he has become.

“If Thomson could only be alive today, he would die of shock,” she said.

Gardiner said she has no misgivings about selling the painting. For the record, her friend returned the painting after it was assessed and the two remain close.

“She decided it was really my painting and it belonged to my family. Talk about a good friend.”

They’re still planning that cruise and Gardiner said she also wants to buy a “nice easy chair” with some of the money from the sale. The rest, she said, she’ll give to her son.

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“I think my dad would be pleased that it’s sort of run its course. I’m hopeful that it goes to some place more public, that more people can enjoy it,” she said.

The painting will be on display in Toronto later this month, with the auction May 30 at Design Exchange on Bay St.

Correction: Previous versions of this story incorrectly stated where the auction will take place. It is in Toronto, not Vancouver.

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