From Oprah Winfrey and Christopher Nolan to Kim Kardashian and Robert De Niro: Inside the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art Opening Gala — SkimNews
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- The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art held its opening gala Saturday night in L.A.'s Exposition Park, drawing a powerhouse crowd that included Oprah Winfrey, Leonardo DiCaprio, Harrison Ford, Christopher Nolan, Kim Kardashian, Samuel L. Jackson, Denis Villeneuve, Justin Trudeau, Gov. Gavin Newsom, and Nancy Pelosi.
- George Lucas and Mellody Hobson entirely self-funded the $1.5 billion museum, which took 20 years to build after nearly landing in San Francisco and then Chicago before settling at Exposition Park.
- The five-story, 300,000-square-foot building designed by Ma Yansong of MAD Architects — frequently described as a 'spaceship' — houses 35 galleries displaying 1,200 works pulled from Lucas's 30,000-piece private art collection across a 13-acre campus.
- Lucas described the museum as a 'temple to illustrators,' saying illustrators from R. Crumb to Norman Rockwell have all told him the same thing: 'I wish I could be in a museum.'
- Hobson pushed back against critics who dismiss narrative art, telling the crowd: 'If critics say a museum of narrative art is too much like a popcorn movie and not enough like an art film, well, we like popcorn movies in our family.'
- Queen Latifah emceed the evening, with co-chairs Julie Bell, Guillermo del Toro, Greta Gerwig, Lewis Hamilton, JR, Steven Spielberg, and Pharrell Williams joining her onstage; the program included a drone show narrated by Winfrey and Jackson and a Black Eyed Peas performance.
- The museum opens to the general public on Sept. 22.
Why it matters: The $1.5 billion museum, fully self-funded by Lucas and Hobson, gives illustration and narrative art — long marginalized by traditional fine-art institutions — a permanent 300,000-square-foot home in L.A., with 1,200 works from Lucas's 30,000-piece collection on view after a 20-year journey that nearly landed in San Francisco and Chicago instead.
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