He said: \u201cEach art piece tells a story. Everybody can look at the same thing, and then we can create different stories.\u201d<\/p>\n
The museum was built on what used to be a parking lot next to the University of Southern California, the film-maker\u2019s alma mater.<\/p>\n
For Brenda Chambliss, a resident of the area in south Los Angeles for more than a decade, it \u201cmeans everything\u201d that Lucas put the museum in the neighbourhood.<\/p>\n
The area can carry a \u201cstigma\u201d tied to crime or poverty, she said, and the \u201cbreathtaking\u201d building filled with art is a positive new attraction, not least for its surrounding park that\u2019s open to the public without a ticket.<\/p>\n
At the entrance, visitors are greeted by the yellow Naboo N-1 starfighter from Star Wars: Episode I \u2013 The Phantom Menace (1999), but with more than 9300 square meters of exhibition space, the offerings go far beyond the beloved saga.<\/p>\n
A visitor takes a photo of scale models of the podracers from The Phantom Menace. Photo \/ AFP<\/p>\n
Its more than 30 galleries feature works by artists including Banksy, Frida Kahlo, Jacob Lawrence, Charles White and Robert Colescott; comics by Winsor McCay, Jack Kirby and Frank Frazetta; and illustrations by Norman Rockwell, Jessie Willcox Smith and NC Wyeth.<\/p>\n
Sandi Granados, who was in the gift shop buying a trippy colourful print of Darth Vader flanked by Stormtroopers, said: \u201cI really love that Lucas is using his platform to bring other artists together.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not just for him. He\u2019s using his name to help local artists and big artists come together.\u201d<\/p>\n
– AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"He said: \u201cEach art piece tells a story. Everybody can look at the same thing, and then we…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":609004,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[89275,16535,29059,156,17515,9517,12856,10813,293,26662,80151,178,18927,51211,15399,3586,39279,117,111,139,69,10521,128308,29541,85053,2737,3934,121829,1361,61,9976,45531],"class_list":["post-609003","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-alike","tag-colossal","tag-descended","tag-entertainment","tag-experience","tag-fans","tag-george","tag-grand","tag-his","tag-itself","tag-lining","tag-longawaited","tag-lovers","tag-lucas","tag-massive","tag-museum","tag-narrative","tag-new","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-opening","tag-personally","tag-recalls","tag-spaceship","tag-star","tag-structure","tag-superfans","tag-that","tag-to","tag-wars","tag-welcomes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/609003","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=609003"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/609003\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/609004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=609003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=609003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=609003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}