Mellody Hobson and George Lucas celebrate opening of $1 billion Los Angeles museum
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Oprah Winfrey, Queen Latifah, Samuel L. Jackson, Tyler Perry, Spike Lee and more celebrated the museum’s long-awaited opening.
Mellody Hobson and George Lucas welcomed prominent Hollywood stars to celebrate the opening of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles on Saturday. The Lucas Museum opening comes years after the couple sought to help preserve the historic EBONY and JET archives and supported arts education through a $10 million Spelman donation.
The Los Angeles Times reported that Oprah Winfrey, Gayle King, Queen Latifah, Samuel L. Jackson, Tyler Perry, Spike Lee, Cynthia Erivo and Magic Johnson were among the guests at the museum’s opening-night celebration in Exposition Park.
Hobson, who co-founded the museum with her husband addressed the crowd alongside Lucas. She recalled the years it took to bring the project to Los Angeles after earlier plans in San Francisco and Chicago failed to move forward.
Queen Latifah helped co-host the evening and praised the new institution while introducing Lucas and Hobson. Voices of Fire, the Virginia Beach vocal collective co-founded by Pharrell Williams and Bishop Ezekiel Williams, performed during the festivities.
The guest list also included Harrison Ford, Robert De Niro, Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Hamill, Kim Kardashian and filmmakers. Perry and Lee joined Lucas, Steven Spielberg, Christopher Nolan, Guillermo del Toro, Jon M. Chu and others for a large group photograph of directors inside the museum.
The evening ended with a drone show narrated by Winfrey and Jackson. Images from the museum’s collection appeared in the sky before the Black Eyed Peas performed for guests.
The $1 billion museum spans roughly 300,000 square feet, including more than 100,000 square feet of gallery space across more than 30 galleries. Its collections combine illustration, comics, paintings, film-related artwork and other forms of visual storytelling.
Lucas said the museum is intended to challenge traditional ideas about what belongs in an art institution, particularly by giving illustrators and popular visual art greater recognition.
The Lucas Museum opening marks the end of a years-long effort by Hobson and Lucas to create the institution. The museum officially opens to the public on Sept. 22.