Auckland Art Gallery is asking Bay people to look closer at the portrait on their grandparents' mantelpiece or check under the bed in the spare room. They may have a long-lost artwork of one of New Zealand's most celebrated artists.
The gallery is appealing to the public to help find more than about 100 original paintings by prolific 19th-century artist Gottfried Lindauer held in family collections or tucked away in forgotten nooks.
Gallery director Rhana Devenport said Lindauer's paintings were national treasures.
Portraits of Maori chiefs and leaders of the 19th and early 20th centuries remained hugely significant as a record of New Zealand's history and heritage.
The gallery's curator of Maori art, Nigel Borell, said many more paintings had yet to surface and finding the missing artworks would help further research for an extensive exhibition about the artist.