{"id":853711,"date":"2026-09-19T22:54:15","date_gmt":"2026-09-19T22:54:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/853711\/"},"modified":"2026-09-19T22:54:15","modified_gmt":"2026-09-19T22:54:15","slug":"sure-it-has-star-wars-but-the-lucas-museums-free-library-and-gardens-are-just-as-stellar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/853711\/","title":{"rendered":"Sure, it has \u2018Star Wars,\u2019 but the Lucas Museum\u2019s free library and gardens are just as stellar"},"content":{"rendered":"

You\u2019ve probably already seen footage of the Star Wars props, the Van Gogh\u2013inspired Pikachu and the striking spaceship-like architecture. But the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art\u2019s<\/a> most unique assets actually might be outside of the galleries\u2014and,\u00a0after it officially debuts on September 22, open to visitors for free, no museum ticket<\/a> required.<\/p>\n

George Lucas has referred to his eponymous institution as a temple to the people\u2019s art, where a self-portrait of Frida Kahlo, an oil painting of dogs playing poker and a screen-used Batman suit make unexpected neighbors. But that for-the-people perspective also\u2014especially\u2014extends to the entrancing gardens<\/a> surrounding the building, as well as the open-to-the-public library<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love that if you walk into our parks and gardens, you feel different,\u201d says Lucas Museum CEO Tracey Bates. \u201cYou do feel like you\u2019ve been transported somewhere else, which is the joy of storytelling\u2014which is what the museum is all about.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Lucas
\nPhotograph: Michael Juliano for Time OutLucas Museum of Narrative Art <\/p>\n

Whether you enter down the street from the Metro<\/a> station on Vermont Avenue, across from the Natural History Museum<\/a> and Coliseum<\/a> at Bill Robertson Lane or into the middle of the Exposition Park<\/a>\u2013adjacent campus via the parking garage, you\u2019ll find yourself in a mix of open grassy spaces and meandering walking paths. (Access here is completely separate from the museum galleries, which cost $25 for adults and nothing for kids 17 and under.) Dense clusters of native flora that\u2019ve been maturing off-site for the past six years add much-needed greenery to what was once a parking lot. The cloud-shaped profile of the museum<\/a> building, designed by Ma Yansong of MAD Architects, seems to float above the multi-tiered gardens.<\/p>\n

\"Sculpture
\nPhotograph: Michael Juliano for Time OutSculpture of Leia strangling Jabba the Hutt at the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art <\/p>\n

\"Lucas
\nPhotograph: Michael Juliano for Time OutLucas Museum of Narrative Art <\/p>\n

And then there\u2019s the bronze statue of Jabba the Hutt\u2014being strangled by a shackle-wielding Leia. And Padm\u00e9 fighting off a pillar-climbing nexu \u00e0 la Attack of the Clones. Or a fountain topped with Yoda and his post-Disney-acquisition counterpart, Grogu. Star Wars may only represent 7% of the museum\u2019s displays, but it\u2019s well represented in the gardens. It\u2019s not the only art on display, though: You\u2019ll also find, among other pieces, sculptures of Rosie the Riveter, King Kong stop-motion animator Willis O\u2019Brien and Terracotta Daughters, artist Prune Nourry\u2019s response to China\u2019s famous Terracotta Army.<\/p>\n

The free-to-visit park<\/a> space, designed by Mia Lehrer and the team at Studio-MLA, also boasts a shallow amphitheater along its southern end. Though the full slate of programming is still to come, Bates expects that once a month on either Friday or Saturday (when the museum is open until 9pm), there\u2019ll be a relatively large activation in the amphitheater (either for free or via accessibly priced tickets).<\/p>\n

\"Lucas
\nPhotograph: Michael Juliano for Time OutLucas Museum of Narrative Art <\/p>\n

\"Yoda
\nPhotograph: Michael Juliano for Time OutYoda and Grogu sculpture at the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art <\/p>\n

But you don\u2019t need a formal event to unwind in the garden: Bates invites people to come on their way home from school, before an LAFC match, to sit down and sketch, or for a meal at a picnic table after a visit to the California Science Center<\/a>. \u201cWe want it to become part of their daily lives almost,\u201d she says. \u201cI just want people to feel safe, relaxed, and I\u2019d love to inspire creativity here because that\u2019s what George would want.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Library
\nPhotograph: Michael Juliano for Time OutLibrary at the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art <\/p>\n

Speaking of creativity, the library here just might be the most imaginative space in the entire campus. Research libraries may typically give off a stuffy, studious air, but that\u2019s certainly not the case at the Lucas Museum\u2019s library, where light streams through the building\u2019s spaceship-like shell and into a warm, Arts and Crafts\u2013style sitting area with three floors of shelves carrying art books on everything from paleoart to Renaissance warfare to rock & roll posters.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s an all-encompassing collection that library director Joan Jocson-Singh hopes will draw in all walks of visitors\u2014and the free admission is certainly a strong incentive too. \u201cThe fact that we\u2019re open to the community and that you don\u2019t need to pay for a museum ticket really, I think, dismantles the notion that libraries are for a specific type of person,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

You\u2019re welcome to peruse any of the books on the first-floor shelves and sit and linger as you read through them. (The library opens the same time as the museum and closes an hour earlier; just mention you\u2019re headed there at the security checkpoint, look for the Naboo starfighter in the main plaza\u2019s south building and then head up to the circulation desk.)<\/p>\n

\"Lucas
\nPhotograph: Michael Juliano for Time OutLucas Museum of Narrative Art <\/p>\n

The collection started when the museum\u2019s curators began researching some of the works that would ultimately go on display in the main galleries; these first-floor shelves mirror those themes, with books on comics, illustration and graphic arts, among other topics, and everything from Norman Rockwell to Dungeons & Dragons to the Separate Cinema Archive of early Black filmmaking.<\/p>\n

Spot any books with their covers facing out and they\u2019re likely some of Jocson-Singh\u2019s favorites, whether that\u2019s a primer on Hollywood portrait photographers, a collection of He-Man illustrations or a celebration of Babar. And over on the tables, you\u2019ll spot what she refers to as, well, table books: heavy, oversized Taschen editions that are typically kept behind a shop counter, but here they\u2019re out in the open with X-Men comics, Donald Duck drawings or the sci-fi and fantasy works of Frank Frazetta.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome of these books are out of print and rare,\u201d Jocson-Singh says. \u201cBut it also gives you insight into our founders [George Lucas and Mellody Hobson]; you\u2019re learning about the art that\u2019s in the galleries that may not have titles that circulate widely, and it\u2019s pretty unique because this museum is legitimizing and, what I like to say, academicizing art that hasn\u2019t had a home before.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Library
\nPhotograph: Michael Juliano for Time OutLibrary at the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art <\/p>\n

Though the mezzanine and third-floor shelves are off limits to the public, they\u2019re filled with fascinating collections for researchers: titles about military history, vehicles, the occult, adventuring and Americana gifted straight from Lucas and Hobson\u2019s personal collection at Skywalker Ranch (the museum shelves are even styled as an homage to that private library), as well as volumes on major art movements like modernism, cubism and Canadian landscape art that have been donated by Steve Martin. (Some museum-loving Angelenos may remember that the comedy icon curated an exhibition<\/a> on that latter topic at the Hammer Museum<\/a> about a decade ago.)<\/p>\n

All of the books in the library are non-circulating (so you can\u2019t take them out of the room), and once you\u2019re done reading, don\u2019t bother trying to place them back on the shelves yourself: A bright orange book trolley with a photo of Yoda reminds you, \u201cReshelve, do not. Leave books here, you must!\u201d You can expect to find a full catalog to browse on the museum\u2019s website following the September 22 opening.<\/p>\n

For Jocson-Singh, that day is likely to be a pretty monumental moment. \u201cThe first time we started doing previews and had people in the space\u2026 seeing children come in and light up,\u201d she says. \u201cTo see adults come in here and look at books that they had such invested interest in that you typically don\u2019t see in a museum library just felt so rewarding.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"You\u2019ve probably already seen footage of the Star Wars props, the Van Gogh\u2013inspired Pikachu and the striking spaceship-like…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":853712,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[1029,41833,88,206,41834],"class_list":["post-853711","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-art","tag-categories-art","tag-entertainment","tag-movies","tag-news-art"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/853711","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=853711"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/853711\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/853712"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=853711"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=853711"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=853711"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}