147 Cuba Street

Since March 1971 when we moved to Wellington, once a month, like clockwork, an envelope often hand-addressed by Peter McLeavey has arrived in our mailbox announcing his next exhibition. Toward the end of the month for many, many years, an invoice or statement with what we owed in our laborious part payments would follow.

Peter was selling work from his flat on the Terrace for a couple of years before opening at 147 Cuba Street where he still puts up 10 or so exhibitions a year. He once told an interviewer his reason for setting up shop in Wellington and, "not in Aussie, not in downtown Dusseldorf. Not going into Madrid on a Friday night, but here,” was because, “there wasn't any Prado in this neck of the woods. There wasn't any Bayreuth on the other side up the Hutt Valley. There was no British Museum here. There was no Met here."

Like many dealers Peter McLeavey is hooked on discretion. There is no tittle-tattle about who’s bought what from the latest show, but now there is an unexpected opportunity to become an insider. Luit Bieringa with photographer Leon Narbey has produced a film on McLeavey called The Man in the Hat giving an hour plus ten look at McLeavey’s world. You can catch it at the International Film Festival. Check out your local screening times by entering The Man in the Hat into the search box here.
Image: Peter McLeavey hanging a painting by Julian Dashper in September 1989.

Other OTN Posts about or around Peter McLeavey
Where in the world is Peter McLeavey
McLeavey: Give us a sign
Hans and Martha Lachmann
McLeavey sighting