After nearly a decade of construction and delays, a spaceship has touched down in Exposition Park in Los Angeles: the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, which opens to the public on September 22. The massive $1 billion project is the home for more than 40,000 works of art and pieces of pop culture history, essentially all of which have come from the personal collections of “Star Wars” creator George Lucas and his wife Mellody Hobson, one of the most accomplished businesswomen in the world.
Only 1,200 works are actually on display in the Lucas Museum’s thirty-plus galleries, and as the name suggests, while the galleries are comprised of vastly different genres, artists and types of art, it’s all tied together under the umbrella of visual storytelling. As we all know, there are few things more useful in visual storytelling than vehicles, and as I discovered when I got to attend a member preview day a couple weeks ago the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art has by far the best collection of vehicular art I’ve ever seen, especially when compared to regular art museums. Traditional car museums often have amazing car-related works of art on display (their actual physical cars aside), but that’s all typically marketing artwork or design sketches where the car is the absolute focus.
And I’m not just talking about the “Star Wars” art and props that are on display, though those are really excellent. Across all the various galleries are incredible paintings, illustrations, comic book proofs, photographs and prints that feature vehicles being used to tell a story. There’s a lot of cars, of course, as well as motorcycles, planes, trains, all sorts of boats, and my favorites, all of the sci-fi art with spaceships and rockets and more. If you ever find yourself in Los Angeles, I simply implore to check out the Lucas Museum, even if you think you may be art museum–averse.
Now THIS is podracing!
OK, let’s talk about “Star Wars” first. Items from the franchise only make up less than 10% of the whole museum, but the gallery is the most prominently featured one. Walk into the room and you’re immediately greeted by Anakin’s full scale podracer from “A Phantom Menace,” which is truly awesome to see up close. We really need a full-on podracing–focused movie, don’t we? Lemme get a script going…
Across the way are the full-scale fiberglass speeder models from the chase scene in “Attack of the Clones,” seen at the top of this story. Keep walking through the gallery and you’ll see Luke’s landspeeder from “A New Hope,” two Empire speeders from the Endor scene “Return of the Jedi,” and Mace Windu’s speeder from “Attack of the Clones.” Hanging from the ceiling in the lobby of the museum’s library is a Naboo Starfighter from “The Phantom Menace,” which has got to be one of the best spaceship designs of all time.
All of these vehicles are accompanied by wax figures wearing the costumes from the movie (and some of their faces are a bit… off), with great backdrops that give a sense of motion. I could’ve stood there and stared at the details all day, figuring out how the various vehicles were actually built and put together using real-life stuff, and painted and designed to fit in the worlds of the films.
One of the coolest props wasn’t actually used in its movie, at least not for real. In “Revenge of the Sith,” General Grievous rides a sick single-wheel bike thing that has four deployable claws for walking, which he uses in a chase against Obi-Wan. In the movie it’s all digital effects, but for the opening of the museum Lucas had this life-size replica built, and it frickin’ rules.
Size isn’t everything
Even more fascinating than the big stuff are all the scale models on display. Behind Anakin’s full-size pod racer are a bunch of scale models of other pod racers, including Sebulba’s, which is obviously the coolest. These were made from metal, plastic, fiberglass, rubber, electronics and other materials, and it’s unbelievable how much detail there is packed into these little things.
Also from “A Phantom Menace” are scale models of the AAT tank and MTT troop carrier used by the Trade Federation, the latter being accompanied by a bunch of little B1 Battle Droids. These models have lovely patina on them, looking like they really have been through battle. Say what you will about the prequels, but the teams at Lucasfilm and Industrial Light & Magic really freaked it when it came to ship designs.
The details become even more fantastic when you see the scale models from the original trilogy, especially the Millennium Falcon. It’s a “kit bashing” amalgam of over 2,500 individual parts from 150 different model kits, ranging from German tanks and planes to Formula 1 race cars. Every time I watch the original trilogy (and really any sci-fi movie that uses miniatures), I’m completely transfixed by the full-scale vehicles, small-scale models, and the cinematography tricks and visual effects used to make them feel as real as possible.
Other original trilogy models include an A-wing (much cooler than X-wings), a Y-wing (also cooler than X-wings), a clone troop carrier from “Attack of the Clones,” multiple sizes of AT-ST from “The Empire Strikes Back,” and a model of a downed AT-AT crashed into the snow. My favorite model was a miniature Jawa sandcrawler, placed next to a full-size Jawa costume. I just love those ‘lil guys.
Covering the walls in the “Star Wars” gallery are prints and original concept artwork from episodes one through six, created by iconic artists like Ralph McQuarrie and Doug Chiang. Some of these pieces are more atmospheric scenes, like a Jawa sandcrawler at night or ships landing in Cloud City, while others depict action scenes from the movies. All of it is just stunning.
Much more than just Star Wars
But like I said, there is far more than just “Star Wars” when it comes to vehicular representation. I’m only pointing out a small fraction of the art that has a car or a boat or a plane in it — the few things that moved me enough to take a photo, as I only had a few hours to spend walking around — but nearly every gallery has different types of transportation represented. Lots of horses, too. Those count as transportation, right?
My absolute favorite galleries in the museum are the Graphic Stories, Manga and Comics sections, featuring original drawings and illustration, comic strip proofs, and cover layouts. Just look how badass that “Ghost Rider” illustration is, and the colorful works from “Kamen Rider” and “Grand Prix.” Though not car-related, the Comics gallery has one of the best “The Far Side” panels of all time, plus original strips from “Garfield,” “Peanuts,” and so many more. And it’s impossible not to be mesmerized by the cover artwork from “Captain America,” “Superman,” and all sorts of weird comic books you may not have even heard of.
Wait, maybe the Science Fiction gallery was my favorite. It’s full of lush works by artists like Vincent Di Fate, Ed Emshwiller, Henrique Correa and Robert McCall. (The painting at the top of this slide is McCall’s “Heavy Traffic” from 1970.) As a kid I was always obsessed with the art from pulpy sci-fi book covers and comic anthologies, so I was walking around slack-jawed at how awesome it all was.
There’s cars in other parts of the museum, too. In the Children’s Stories room, Charles Twelvetrees’ 1910 gouache and watercolor work “Little Boy and Dog in Speeding Roadster” is just delightful, and in the Play section I loved John Philip Falter’s 1961 oil painting “Drive-In Movie in the Rain,” a fantastic example of color and atmosphere and movement, with cars being integral to the storytelling. Elsewhere are incredible paintings of historic naval battles, concept art from “Indiana Jones,” There’s even a whole gallery full of Norman Rockwell paintings, who always did such a good job capturing vehicles.
I’ve only scratched the surface of what’s on display at the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, and if you can handle looking at art that doesn’t have vehicles in it, there are hundreds of other works in the museum that will capture your imaginations. What makes this museum really exciting is that the galleries will rotate different works in and out, both ones from Lucas’ vast collection and pieces that could be on loan from others. The Cinema gallery that currently has all the “Star Wars” stuff on display will also be eventually rotating new things in, too. I already know this is going to be one of my most visited places in the city.
The general public will be able to visit the museum starting tomorrow, September 22, with tickets available on the Lucas Museum’s website. Maybe best of all, the parking garage is lovely! Easy entrances and exits, big parking spots, a bunch of EV chargers. That really does matter in LA.
