A gallery in Scotland announced Thursday that it had discovered an unexpected self-portrait of Vincent Van Gogh, with his ear undamaged, covered up behind another artwork.

The portrait was discovered hidden behind layer upon layer of glue and cardboard on the back of the canvas of “Head of a Peasant Woman,” an 1885 work by the Dutch post-Impressionist.

It depicts a bearded sitter wearing a brimmed hat and a neckerchief tied lightly around his neck. This was finished before Van Gogh ripped his left ear in 1888.

Visitors to the National Galleries of Scotland in Edinburgh will be allowed to see it as an X-ray image in a uniquely designed lightbox at an upcoming showcase.

Curators are cooperating on safely retrieving it from the overlaying canvas without distorting the paintings in the long run.

The National Galleries’ senior painting specialist, Lesley Stevenson, said they were “thrilled to bits” by the discovery.

“When we saw the X-ray for the first time of course we were hugely excited,” she said.

“This is a significant discovery because it adds to what we already know about Van Gogh’s life. “There is lots to think about with regards to the next steps, but for us it is another little nugget to get us a little bit closer to an incredible artist.”

Curators assume the painting, which was decided to sell only after his suicide in 1890, is part of a collection of experimental self-portraits.

Five similar works, painted before he moved to Paris in 1886, are on showcase at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.

Van Gogh, who died unknown and poor, frequently painted on both sides of a canvas to just save money.

The major portrait, which portrays a local woman from a town in the southern Netherlands in which the artist lived from 1883 to 1885, was donated to the gallery in 1960 by Edinburgh lawyer Alexander Maitland.

The self-portrait is thought to have vanished from public view around 1905 when it was deemed the less completed of the two-part and was framed with cardboard.

The discovered work is thought to be from the time when Van Gogh only became acquainted with the work of the French impressionists. He eventually adopted the expressive, colorful style that has created his works some of the most famed in the world.

The artist was depressed and cut off his ear with a razor shortly before Christmas 1888 after suffering from “acute mania with generalised delirium,” according to the hospital.

The self-portrait is thought to have vanished from public view around 1905 when it was deemed the less completed of the two-part and was framed with cardboard.

The discovered work is thought to be from the time when Van Gogh only became acquainted with the work of the French impressionists. He eventually adopted the expressive, colorful style that has created his works some of the most famed in the world.

The artist was depressed and cut off his ear with a razor shortly before Christmas 1888 after suffering from “acute mania with generalised delirium,” according to the hospital.

On July 27, 1890, after wasting hours in an asylum, Van Gogh, 37, shot himself in the chest.