Lucas Museum of Narrative Art

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About the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art

Opening in 2026, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art is a first-of-its-kind institution dedicated to illustrated storytelling across time, cultures, and media. Co-founded by George Lucas and Mellody Hobson, the museum’s collection features 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. The museum also houses the Lucas Archive, containing models, props, concept art, and costumes from Lucas’s filmmaking career.

Designed by Ma Yansong of MAD with a landscape by Mia Lehrer of Studio-MLA and Stantec as executive architect, the museum will be located in Exposition Park, Los Angeles, on an 11- acre campus that includes new green space and a 300,000-square-foot building with galleries, two theaters, a library, restaurant, café, retail store, and community spaces.

Stay Connected
In advance of the museum’s opening, the public is encouraged to sign up for exclusive news and access at lucasmuseum.org and follow the museum on Instagram, Facebook, and X.

 

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Lucas Museum of Narrative Art Sneak Peek Panel: Martin Scorsese, JR, Boris Vallejo, and Julie Bell Talked About the Power of Visual Storytelling at New York Comic Con
At New York Comic Con, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art gave fans an early look at the forthcoming museum and presented a conversation moderated by legendary filmmaker Martin Scorsese with artists JR, Boris Vallejo, and Julie Bell. These storytellers came together to share their perspectives on the power of narrative art and the importance of celebrating popular art forms. The sneak peek of the museum included a 5-minute video that featured renderings, artworks in the collection, and a pre-recorded interview with the co-founders, George Lucas and Mellody Hobson.

Opening in 2026, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art will be the world’s first institution dedicated to the exploration of narrative art—or what the founders call “the people’s art”—celebrating visual storytelling across eras and cultures, from ancient cave drawings and children’s book illustrations to comic books and digital media.

The panelists shared excitement about the forthcoming museum and what it will mean for different genres of art such as illustration and street art to be celebrated permanently within a museum for the first time.

Martin Scorsese, the esteemed director, producer, editor, writer, actor, historian, movie buff, film preservationist and champion of artists’ rights, shared while moderating the panel: “Visual storytelling is very close to my heart. George has been speaking to me about his vision for the museum for many years, where there is no distinction between high art and low art, just images that spark emotion, where we’re told stories that hold us together – stories that connect us. It’s fundamental to who we are as human beings. For me, it was pictures that lead to books, to reading, and to art.”

JR, the creator of monumental public art projects that inspire passersby to ask questions and confront their own perceptions, shared: “I feel the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art is a place where we will be surprised. You'll walk into the museum, and you're walking into thousands of stories. That's what I think is fascinating about narrative art – we are made of stories; we cannot live without stories. That's such an incredible thing that we need in this society today. We need stories to help us share common emotions.”

Boris Vallejo, a globally beloved fantasy artist famous for his illustrations of Tarzan, Conan the Barbarian, and Doc Savage, said when asked about why his work resonates with so many people said: “The only thing that I can say is that I just paint it with all of my soul.”

Julie Bell, the first woman to ever paint Conan for Marvel and an artist and illustrator known for her hyper-realistic heroic fantasy and wildlife paintings, noted: “Stories are what create a culture, bringing us together. They teach you how to be human. The picture is the thing, and you can’t unsee it… I hope that people of all ages walk into the museum, especially little kids, and are enthralled by these gorgeous images, and then have all the feelings from the stories and the characters who they want to grow up to be.”

In advance of the museum’s launch, the public is encouraged to sign up to be the first to hear about exclusive opportunities with the Lucas Museum at lucasmuseum.org/join-us.

 

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Today, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, founded by George Lucas and Mellody Hobson, announced it will open to the public on September 22, 2026. This new cultural institution—architected by Ma Yansong of MAD, with gardens designed by Mia Lehrer of Studio-MLA—is in Los Angeles’s Exposition Park.

The Lucas Museum seeks to explore how stories connect people and capture the human experience. “Stories are mythology, and when illustrated, they help humans understand the mysteries of life,” said George Lucas, co-founder of the museum. The museum was built on the belief that illustrated storytelling is a universal language.

“This is a museum of the people’s art—the images are illustrations of beliefs we live with every day. For that reason, this art belongs to everyone,” said Lucas Museum co-founder Mellody Hobson. “Our hope is that as people move through the galleries, they will see themselves, and their humanity, reflected back.”

The Lucas Museum’s permanent collection holds more than 40,000 works, representing one of the most significant collections of narrative art. The building’s thirty-five galleries occupy 100,000 square feet. Galleries are named to reflect the human experience—love, family, community, play, work, sports, childhood, adventure, and more. They will display familiar pieces by beloved illustrators; mural paintings of the 20th and 21st centuries; comic art, of which the museum has deep and extensive holdings; children’s book illustrations; science-fiction illustrations; and the fantastic visions captured in 20th-century culture. The museum will also display cinematic artifacts, including movie posters, and show documentaries featuring artists and filmmakers.

About the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art Opening in September 2026, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art is dedicated to illustrated storytelling. Founded by George Lucas and Mellody Hobson, the museum’s collection features works by artists such as Norman Rockwell, Kadir Nelson, Jessie Willcox Smith, N. C. Wyeth, Beatrix Potter, Judith F. Baca, Frida Kahlo, and Maxfield Parrish; comic art legends such as Winsor McCay, Jack Kirby, Frank Frazetta, Alison Bechdel, Chris Ware, and Robert Crumb; and photographers Gordon Parks, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and Dorothea Lange. The museum also houses the Lucas Archives, containing models, props, concept art, and costumes from Lucas’s filmmaking career. Designed by Ma Yansong of MAD with a landscape by Mia Lehrer of Studio-MLA and Stantec as executive architect, the museum is in Exposition Park, Los Angeles, on an 11-acre campus that includes new green space and a 300,000-square-foot building with galleries, two theaters, a library, restaurant, café, retail store, and community spaces. Designed by Ma Yansong of MAD with a landscape by Mia Lehrer of Studio-MLA and Stantec as executive architect, the museum will be located in Exposition Park, Los Angeles, on an 11-acre campus that includes new green space and a 300,000-square-foot building with galleries, two theaters, a library, restaurant, café, retail store, and community spaces.

 

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L to R: E. H. Shepard, “Christopher Robin at the enchanted place,” illustration for Home Chat, 1928. Graphite, ink, and watercolor on paper, 9 3/4 x 7 in. (24.8 x 17.8 cm). Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, PKY.3820; Dorothea Lange, Migrant Mother, Nipomo, California, 1936. Gelatin silver print, 18 3/4 x 14 1/2 in. (47.6 x 36.8 cm). Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, PKY.1062; N. C. Wyeth, “For a mile, or thereabouts, my raft went very well,” illustration for Robinson Crusoe, 1920. Oil on canvas, 47 1/8 x 36 1/2 in. (119.7 x 92.7 cm). Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, PKY.3733; Rafael Navarro, art for Sonámbulo: Mexican Stand-Off, 2006. Acrylic on canvas, 24 x 18 x 3/4 in. (45.7 x 60.9 x 1.9). Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, 2021.22.2.


George Lucas and Mellody Hobson co-founded the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art to honor the universal tradition of telling stories through images. Encompassing everything from prehistoric cave paintings to today’s screen art, the Museum explores and celebrates the power of visual storytelling to inspire individuals, give shape to beliefs and ideals, and forge community.

Built in Los Angeles’s Exposition Park, the Museum is housed in a 300,000-square-foot building designed by Ma Yansong of MAD Architects with Stantec to embody the emotional power of narrative art, creating a sense of wonder, possibility, and connection to something larger than ourselves. The building is integrated into a new 11-acre campus including a park designed by Mia Lehrer of Studio-MLA: a green, multilayered gathering place for local communities and an extraordinary programming resource that brings learning and engagement outdoors.

About the Inaugural Exhibitions
The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art explores how artists depict the essential myths that help us make sense of the world, giving us shared values and common beliefs, bringing us together as a community, and creating a sense of belonging.

Inaugural exhibitions include more than 1,200 objects representing narrative art across time and around the world. Installed across more than 30 galleries, they occupy approximately 100,000 square feet of gallery space.

Drawn from the Museum’s founding collection, the exhibitions trace the evolution of human culture through storytelling, from ancient sculptures of gods and goddesses to Renaissance paintings to photographs, comics, and modern cinema.

Many exhibitions are organized by theme, focusing on myths about love, family, community, and adventure that connect every generation. These shared stories, told over and over in many forms, bind us together and define our human experience.

Other exhibitions are devoted to individual artists of the 20th century, whose images connected our modern imaginations with ancient emotions and beliefs.

The exhibitions are filled with familiar and recognizable objects and art that’s part of everyday life, creating welcoming spaces that feel warmly human and provide a sense of belonging.

Contemporary vehicles of visual storytelling such as illustration, comics, and graphic stories have not always received the respect they deserve. The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art creates a home for what George Lucas has called “the people’s art.”

Exhibitions include:

• Architecture - the innovative designs that inspired the architectural vision of the museum
• Benton - selected works of Thomas Hart Benton’s depiction of American life
• Children's stories - illustrations of children’s literature by Beatrix Potter, Leo Politi, E.H. Shepard, Jacob Lawerence, and more
• Cinema - a selection of production designs, props, and costumes from the Lucas Archives
• Everyday life – a series of galleries dedicated to visual stories about Childhood, Community, Family, Love, Motherhood, Play, School, Sports, and Work, expressing the myths that have both reflected and shaped modern American society
• Civic Life – artists’ portrayals of experience in the courthouse, the polling place, the political headquarters, and more
• Comics • Graphic Stories - a showcase of the museum’s deep holdings of American and European comics, including works by Mœbius, Marie Severin, Jack Kirby, Alison Bechdel, Jim Lee, Frank Miller, and Rafael Navarro
• Manga • Anime – selections from the Museum’s collection of the influential work in Japanese illustration and animation
• Frazetta – selected illustrations and book covers by the flamboyant Frank Frazetta
• History - paintings, prints, and illustrations telling (and pointedly re-telling) the stories of major historical events
• Jessie Willcox Smith - classic scenes by the illustrator of fairy tales and childhood scenes
• Murals – large-scale, public works of narrative art by Judith F. Baca, Diego Rivera, and JR
• Narrative Forms: a series of galleries highlighting narrative art across genres of Adventure, Fantasy, Romance, and Science Fiction by artists including Julie Bell, Boris Vallejo, Ken Kelly, Georges Méliès, John C. Berkey, and Jeffrey Catherine Jones
• Parrish – lush, dreamy visions from the early 20th century by illustrator Maxfield Parrish
• Photography – powerful documentary images by Robert Capa, Gordon Parks, Alfred Eisenstaedt, Dorothea Lange, and others
• Rockwell – a selection of the Museum’s renowned holdings of works by premier American illustrator Norman Rockwell
• Wyeth – book illustrations from the 1910s through the 1940s by the incomparable N.C. Wyeth
• Western Stories – myths of the American West, including wagon trains, shoot-outs, frontier towns, and more