htaccess rewrite exception help

I was hoping someone who knows what they are doing could help me with my htaccess issue.

My htaccess has some rewrite rules that do whatever they do to everything coming to my domain.

I want to have an exception for 1 image file which is kept like this:
domain.com/1/2/image.gif

It seems that the htaccess that controls this all for me is in the sub-dir 1.

Sorry I can't be more specific so as to protect the innocent

I have tried:
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/1/2/ and
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/1/2/ image.gif in both the root htaccess and the htaccess in the sub-dir 1 without success.

I have no idea.

Any tips would be great. Cheers all.

Maybe my post is too long. So:
Can someone show me how to make an exception in htaccess so that it doesn't rewrite the following:
http://www.mydomain.com/files/ABC/mypecs.gif.

I want people to see my pecs but every other link coming in needs to be rewitten (and is being handled just fine). I just want the above link to go to the place it refers to.

Thanks

Thanks to the overwhleming support and help given guys. I found a solution and stumbled on a method that made me $1,239,001 last night.

J/K I changed tack and tried something different which worked.

Now I'm off to talk to myself offline.