A Sydney artist remains hopeful that her “priceless” painting, which she dedicated over 100 hours to creating, will be returned after it vanished in what appears to be a case of mistaken identity as street bounty.

Rachael Egan was in the midst of relocating from her home in Erskineville on Tuesday afternoon when the centerpiece of her forthcoming solo exhibition mysteriously disappeared from the sidewalk.

Amid the moving frenzy, the 26-year-old did not notice the painting’s absence until the next morning, when she pondered, “Where on earth is that painting?”

“I spent the entire day moving things in and out,” she shared with 9news.com.au. “We made several trips from the car, and we definitely would have noticed it outside the front.”

“I suspect there was only a brief five- to 10-minute window when it was left outside, and someone must have taken it. It couldn’t have been outside for very long,” Egan explained.

Egan spent 100 hours over several months this year painting the piece and had planned to sell it at her very first solo exhibition in January.

To her, it is priceless. 

”I put a lot of love and labour into that work, and it’s the crux of all the other pieces,” she said.

“It was the first piece that jump-started the exhibit.

“So it’s very important to me, and a very special artwork for me.”

The artwork, titled Bliss – field of infinite potential, was born out of a phrase her yoga teacher had said during a class five years ago.

Egan’s mind immediately went to the famed Windows wallpaper.

She spent the years honing her techniques and waiting until she was ready to paint it.

Egan felt up to it this year, but an injury to her dominant hand meant she had to wait another six months to get started.

When she was finally able to pick up the paintbrush, it took her months to create her take on the Windows wallpaper.

It inspired the rest of the art in her collection.

“My exhibit is an exploration of fields with infinite potentials, but some literal like that, and then others very abstracted,” she said.

Egan has posted up flyers around the street, spoken to neighbours and shared her art on social media to help reunite her with her painting. 

She is convinced it will be returned, believing someone had mistaken it for an item destined for council pickup.

“I know it was an innocent mistake, I’m sure someone fully just took it with street bounty, it wasn’t actually intentionally stolen,” she said.

“I just really have faith that whoever took it will see this and will return it to me, and they can come to my exhibit because they obviously liked my artwork.”