Masterpieces from surrealist movement, including works by Salvador Dalí, arrive in NZ

Members of the public will soon be able to feast their eyes on masterpieces from the surrealist movement, including works by Salvador Dalí.

Starting Saturday, 180 pieces by surrealist artists will be on show at Wellington's Te Papa Museum until the end of October.

All of the pieces are on loan from the Netherlands Boijmans Museum. 

It has taken three years of planning to get the pieces, worth hundreds of millions of dollars, to New Zealand. 

"There's never been a big show of Dalí's work in New Zealand. I keep having a bit of a double take when I'm walking through the galleries and seeing works and realising that they're in Wellington," Te Papa curator Lizzie Bisley told 1 NEWS.

Te Papa expects the exhibition to draw 100,000 visitors.