A century-old story of an artist's secret love has come to light in Australia thanks to the painstaking work of a National Gallery of Victoria art restorer.

Hidden in paintings featured at the gallery's new Australian Impressionism exhibit is a love story involving one of the country's best-known impressionists, Arthur Streeton.

Michael Varcoe-Cocks points out the nude female figure discovered after an X-ray of Spring, a painting by one of Australia's best-known impressionist artists, Arthur Streeton.
(William West/AFP/Getty)

Art conservator Michael Varcoe-Cocks had been carefully working on restoring Streeton's painting Spring for about a year when he came across a microscopic discovery: an inscription hidden in the paint referring to an unknown woman named Florry.

"It's very, very small — you can't see it with the naked eye," Varcoe-Cocks told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

"It seems that Arthur Streeton had a strong affection for [a woman named] Florence and put her name in the painting," which the artist completed in 1890 while living in Melbourne.
 
A later X-ray scan of the canvas revealed a nude female figure that the young Streeton had painted over.

Intrigued, staffers also discovered other inscriptions, bearing messages like "Florry and Smike [Streeton's nickname]" and "Florry Walker's my sweetheart."

After some detective work, gallery officials determined that the woman with whom Streeton was infatuated was Florence Walker, the younger sister of an art school colleague. At the time, however, society would have frowned upon a relationship between Walker, who was from a wealthy family, and a working artist like Streeton.

"We don't really think there actually was a relationship as such. They were both young people, both unmarried, and eventually they both went on to marry other people many years later," said Varcoe-Cocks.

The gallery recently made contact with Walker's descendants, in an attempt to fill in the blanks, and were astonished when the family presented a never-before-seen Streeton artwork, which was unveiled to the public on Tuesday.

Oliver Streeton takes a closer look at Flight of Summer, a previously unknown painting by his grandfather Arthur Streeton on Tuesday. The Australian impressionist's masterpiece Spring is seen in the background.
(William West/AFP/Getty)

The painting, entitled Flight of Summer, is dominated by thorny branches of flowers and depicts a mysterious female figure surrounded by wisps of smoke. Streeton had painted it for and presented it to Walker, her family said.

The artist's grandson, Oliver Streeton, said he believes the work is a bittersweet gift that denoted his grandfather's realization that he had "no hope" winning her hand.

Nevertheless, unravelling the tale of Streeton's secret love has been a rewarding endeavour for conservator Varcoe-Cocks.

"For the restorer, to have this sort of insight into what the person's thinking is … really wonderful and quite a special moment in Australian art history," he said.

With files from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation