After Star Wars director George Lucas took his proposed museum of narrative art packing to Chicago two years ago, despite pleas from the mayor and other local leaders to consider a few more sites here, there's a new full-court press to lure Lucas back. A full page ad in the Chronicle this past Friday much like one that was taken out in 2014 attempts to make it loud and clear to Lucas that he should most definitely build the museum on Treasure Island, as we learned last week he's considering doing.
"Dear George Lucas," the ad, embedded below, reads. "Thank you for all you have done for San Francisco. We care about arts education for our young people and believe The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art belongs in San Francisco."
"Its programs are important to all our innovators, artists, educators, and residents from every diverse background," it continues. "You have contributed a great deal to the cultural and economic prosperity of our region and we appreciate the importance of what this extraordinary collection and vital public programs would offer to future generations."
Funding for the plea appears to have come from sf.citi — an organization that, according to its website, "represent[s] the tech sector in conversation with city policy makers."
Both former and current elected officials lent support to the effort, and the names of Dianne Feinstein, Gavin Newsom, Willie Brown, and David Chiu grace the page.
Treasure Island is set to undergo a 20-year redevelopment plan that will add roughly 8,000 new housing units (in addition to several hotels), and it is in this redevelopment that the museum would be slotted.
"Treasure Island is wide open for the kind of development that could incorporate this particular facility and give it a sense of place, so that people recognize that Treasure Island is a place worth going to and an important part of San Francisco," ABC 7 quotes former SF Mayor Art Agnos as saying.
This conversation is only possible because of the problems Lucas is still having in his wife's hometown of Chicago, the city he chose to bring the museum to after he failed to secure approval to build it in the Presidio.
City officials are planning to meet with Lucas's team this week to discuss details of the potential Treasure Island site. Showing the Attack of the Clones director Friday's Chronicle ad will likely help officials make the case that after a false start, SF is finally ready for both Lucas and his museum.
Previously: Oh For God's Sake: George Lucas Is Back, Wants To Build His Museum On Treasure Island Now
Image via Chicago Architecture.
