{"id":278730,"date":"2025-11-12T18:38:12","date_gmt":"2025-11-12T18:38:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/278730\/"},"modified":"2025-11-12T18:38:12","modified_gmt":"2025-11-12T18:38:12","slug":"lucas-museum-of-narrative-art-sets-opening-for-september-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/278730\/","title":{"rendered":"Lucas Museum of Narrative Art Sets Opening for September 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tAfter years of false starts and several postponements, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art has an opening date.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe new cultural institution designed to celebrate illustrated storytelling, founded by Star Wars creator George Lucas<\/a> and his wife Mellody Hobson, will open to the public on Sept. 22, 2026.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThis is a museum of the people\u2019s art. The images are illustrations of beliefs we live with every day,\u201d said Hobson in a statement making the date announcement. \u201cFor that reason, this art belongs to everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tLocated in Los Angeles\u2019s Exposition Park, the building will have 35 galleries occupying 100,000 square feet. Galleries will be named to reflect the human experience, including love, family, community, play, work, and sports. The Lucas Museum will boast a permanent collection that holds more than 40,000 works representing one of the most significant collections of narrative art.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cStories are mythology, and when illustrated, they help humans understand the mysteries of life,\u201d stated Lucas.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe collection will showcase works by artists including Norman Rockwell, Kadir Nelson, Jessie Willcox Smith, N. C. Wyeth, Beatrix Potter, Judy Baca, Frida Kahlo, and Maxfield Parrish; as well as comic art legends such as Winsor McCay, Jack Kirby, Frank Frazetta, Alison Bechdel, Chris Ware, and R. Crumb; and photographers Gordon Parks, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and Dorothea Lange.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe museum will also house the Lucas Archives, containing models, props, concept art, and costumes from Lucas\u2019s filmmaking career.<\/p>\n

\n\tWednesday\u2019s announcement also came with reveals of works newly announced to be on display in the museum.\u00a0Among the pieces are Frazetta\u2019s cover for A Princess of Mars (1970); Rockwell\u2019s cover for The Saturday Evening Post, \u201cAge of Romance\u201d; an unpublished Potter drawing titled \u201cMouse with a spinning wheel\u201d (1890); \u201cThe Duel on the Beach,\u201d a Wyeth illustration for Ladies\u2019 Home Journal (1926); and Ernie Barnes\u2019 \u201cThe Critics Corner\u201d (2007).<\/p>\n

\n\tLucas has been on a tour, drumming up interest in the museum. In July, he made his first ever appearance<\/a> at San Diego International Comic-Con in a panel with filmmaker Guillermo del Toro, Star Wars\u00a0production designer Doug Chiang, and moderator Queen Latifah. In October, he showed up at New York Comic Con with a panel moderated by Martin Scorsese and guests Boris Vallejo and Julie Bell, both known for their fantasy paintings and posters.<\/p>\n

\n\tAt a reported cost of $1 billion, the museum has been more than a decade in the making. The founders went down the road with San Francisco and Chicago before public and political complications proved to be looming Death Stars. After selecting Los Angeles in 2017, construction broke ground in 2018 with the aim to open in 2021. Delays due to the pandemic and construction issues pushed the opening to 2023 then to 2025 and finally to 2026.<\/p>\n

\n\tSee some of the new art pieces below. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tThe Duel on the Beach, illustration for Ladies\u2019 Home Journal<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCourtesy of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Arts<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tCover for A Princess of Mars<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCourtesy of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Arts<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tAge of Romance, cover for The Saturday Evening Post, November 10<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCourtesy of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Arts<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tThe Critic\u2019s Corner<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCourtesy of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Arts<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After years of false starts and several postponements, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art has an opening date.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":278731,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[76,354,355,49,48,356,75,29748],"class_list":{"0":"post-278730","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-arts","9":"tag-arts-and-design","10":"tag-artsanddesign","11":"tag-ca","12":"tag-canada","13":"tag-design","14":"tag-entertainment","15":"tag-george-lucas"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278730","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=278730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278730\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/278731"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=278730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=278730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=278730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}