In advance of its opening in Los Angeles, USA, on 22nd September 2026, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art has revealed its inaugural Film Program, showcasing cinema as both a powerful vehicle for telling stories and an advanced technology for creating moving visual experiences.
The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art celebrates the power of visual storytelling. Founded by Star Wars creator and director George Lucas and Mellody Hobson, the former chairman of DreamWorks Animation and , the museum explores how images move us and shape our collective memory.
From Frida Kahlo’s self-portrait to Norman Rockwell’s scenes of everyday life to Charles White’s portraits of dignity. Each invites reflection. Each tells a story.
Designed by Ma Yansong of MAD, the Lucas Museum is located in Exposition Park in the South Los Angeles region. The museum’s campus includes new green space designed by Mia Lehrer and her team at Studio-MLA. Inside the building, our galleries explore timeless themes – family, love, work, play, fantasy, and more. Additional spaces include two state-of-the-art cinematic theaters and dedicated areas for learning, dining, retail, and events.
Located in South Los Angeles’s Exposition Park, the museum stands within a constellation of cultural institutions and a wider community rich in history, creativity, and learning.
MAD conceived the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art as a sculptural, organic form shaped by light, clouds, and the surrounding tree canopy. Rising from Exposition Park, it feels both grounded and ethereal, embodying the museum’s belief in imagination as a shared public resource.
Lifted above the ground, the museum engages with the street on a human scale, encouraging social interaction while preserving views of Exposition Park. Central steel arches spanning 185 feet (56 metres) form a suspended plaza – a shaded, protected gathering space. From here, visitors move through north and south lobbies, where tall ceilings and abundant natural light create welcoming entrances, while the central elliptical Oculus frames a striking view from ground to sky.
The Film Screenings
The details of the opening film screenings were shared at San Diego Comic-Con last weekend, in a panel featuring Lucas Museum Senior Curator and Head of Film Programs Ryan Linkof; Stoopid Buddy Stoodios’ Seth Green and Matthew Senreich; DC’s President, Publisher and Chief Creative Officer, Jim Lee; and moderated by actress and producer Keke Palmer.
Storytelling and technical advances in film making will be represented in its own theater, the Robert Flaherty Theater and the Slavko Vorkapich Theater, where curated film selections will be screened on a non-stop basis throughout the day, offering visitors an open-door, drop-in gallery-like experience.
“We are excited to share details of our inaugural Film Program,” said Tracey Bates, CEO of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art. “George Lucas named the theaters to honour two innovators of cinema: Robert Flaherty and Slavko Vorkapich. The theaters will be spaces to connect with moving images as one of the most transformative modes of visual storytelling, making the Film Program an essential component of a visit to the Lucas Museum.”
“We wanted to offer an alternative to the traditional museum film program and create a dynamic, open-door experience designed for discovery, allowing audiences to encounter cinema as a living, breathing art form at their own pace,” said Ryan Linkof, Senior Curator and Head of Film Programs. “Our inaugural programming will shed light on the evolution of film form and the creative process more broadly, tracing a direct line from early innovators to the modern masterworks of visual storytelling that shape our culture today.”
The tradition of using cinema to capture reality in all its richness will be showcased in a theater named in honour of Robert Flaherty (1884-1951), a pre-eminent trailblazer in documentary filmmaking. The program will include films dedicated to documenting the process of artistic production, many including artists and storytellers featured in inaugural exhibitions.
The tradition of creating magic with the basic elements of film – light, motion, sound, colour, and editing – will be showcased in a theater named in honour of Slavko Vorkapich (1894-1976), who created astonishing montage sequences and special effects for dozens of Hollywood movies from the 1920s through the ’40s, as well as making experimental films of his own.
From 1948 to 1950, Vorkapich was chair of the Department of Film at the University of Southern California, the school that George Lucas would later attend.
Documentary screenings in the Robert Flaherty Theater will include:
- Episodes of a new documentary series commissioned for the Lucas Museum, Seeing is Believing: The Story of Narrative Art, directed by Robin Dashwood
- Episodes of the 2024 television series The Power of Film, created by Howard Suber, Doug Pray, and Laura Gabbert
- Documentaries about artists whose work is exhibited in the Lucas Museum, including Norman Rockwell, Jim Lee, Charles Schulz, Maurice Sendak, Diego Rivera, J.C. Leyendecker, and Weegee
- Comic Book Confidential, directed by Ron Mann
Screenings in the Slavko Vorkapich Theater, dedicated to “the emotion of motion” with innovative short films from the earliest years of the medium to the present, will include:
- Montage sequences by Vorkapich for films such as Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
- Early silent films by Georges Méliès, Émile Cohl, W.K.L. Dickson, Edwin S. Porter, and others
- Early animations by Winsor McCay
- Experimental films of Man Ray, László Moholy-Nagy, and others
- Early sound animations by Walt Disney Studios and Fleischer Studios
- Experimental films by Canadian animator-director Norman McLaren
- Looney Tunes
- Abstract “visual music” works by Mary Ellen Bute, Oskar Fischinger, Jordan Belson, and others
- Excerpts from Busby Berkeley musicals
- Experimental films of the 1960s by Stan Brakhage, Kenneth Anger, and others
- Experimental animation by Vince Collins
- Anime from Cowboy Bebop
- An episode of Star Wars: Visions
- sSudent films by George Lucas, 1965-1969
The films selected for the theaters vary in length from a few minutes to 90 minutes in running time, and visitors may come and go as they like.
The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art opens its doors on September 22. Tickets are now on sale from opening through February 2027, at lucasmuseum.org and is located at One Lucas Plaza, Los Angeles, CA 90037 in Exposition Park. You will be able to get to it by foot, bike, car, rideshare, and more. Hours and Location Information Here
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John is the founder of downthetubes, launched in 1998. He is a comics and magazine editor, writer, and Press Officer for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He also runs Crucible Comic Press.
Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine and Overkill for Marvel UK, Babylon 5 Magazine, Star Trek Magazine, and its successor, Star Trek Explorer, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics; and has edited several comic collections and graphic novels, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”, and Hancock: The Lad Himself, by Stephen Walsh and Keith Page.
He’s the writer of comics such as Pilgrim: Secrets and Lies for B7 Comics; “Crucible”, a creator-owned project with 2000AD artist Smuzz; and “Death Duty” and “Skow Dogs”, with Dave Hailwood.
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