George Lucas shares details of his $1B Narrative Art Museum at Comic-Con, blending fine art, comics, and pop culture ahead of its 2025 opening in LA.

Star Wars creator and ardent art collector George Lucas made his first appearance at Comic-Con on July 27 to give an update on the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, a $1 billion project he and his wife, Mellody Hobson, president and co-CEO of Ariel Investments, are building in Los Angeles. The museum is anticipated to open next year.

Reflecting on more than 50 years of collecting, as he said, after years went by, he began to question himself about what he was going to do with it. Lucas was a firm believer that he did not want to approach art as some sort of investment, as is the case with the usual high-end art collectors who normally sell their work at a given profit. He opposed the notion of purchasing a stunning piece of art only to sell it for millions of dollars years later, claiming that such deals contradicted his understanding of what art actually stands for.

Guillermo del Toro, a fellow director and board member of the museum, and production designer Doug Chiang participated in the panel, which was hosted by actor and rapper Queen Latifah. The museum's stunningly futuristic 300,000-square-foot structure in Exposition Park, designed by Ma Yansong of the company Mad Architects, was shown in new photos and sketches in a six-minute film narrated by Star Wars star Samuel L. Jackson.

Some of its more than 30 galleries are depicted in interior photos, along with immersive areas that include replicas of cave paintings and an entryway flanked by two lamassu sculptures, which are ancient Mesopotamian statues of winged lions with human heads that date back to approximately 710 BC. Additionally, the museum will display items and artwork associated with the Star Wars series, such as futuristic ship models and concept paintings.