George Lucas on opening Lucas Museum of Narrative Art: This one almost broke my will

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Set us as preferred As George Lucas and Mellody Hobson introduced their new $1 billion museum to press, they focused on two things: the long arc of narrative storytelling and the long arc of their hero’s journey to make their dream a reality.“This has been a long haul ...17 years between getting kicked out of cities and trying to get this built, which is in itself eight years,” Lucas said to about 300 reporters in one of the museum’s two screening rooms; the other held an overflow crowd.

“I’m used to doing the impossible.This one almost broke my will.”Lucas described himself as a contrarian, someone driven by doing what others say he can’t.

He added that getting the museum done involved dealing with bureaucracies and people with “contrary thinking.”Indeed, the very ethos of the museum — if you have an emotional connection to something, then it’s art — has been ruffling feathers since its focus on so-called narrative art was announced long ago.There doesn’t seem to be a consensus on what the term even means, or if all art, in one form or another, is narrative art.

By discarding artistic hierarchy of any kind, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art is stepping into an ongoing debate about what kind of work gets to be labeled “art.”The couple first tried for locations in Chicago and San Francisco and finally ended up in Exposition Park, taking over land that was once parking lots and transforming it into a futuristic museum that has been likened to a spaceship.Architect Ma Yansong, who designed the building with his firm MAD, said he’s heard the spaceship comparison, and that’s fine by him, but he’s also heard it likened to a cloud.

“We want to make people curious,” Yansong said.The museum has done just that, with droves of people rushing over the summer to get tickets for its Sept.22 ope...