Poster of the Week -“Modern Times” Charlie Chaplin Extremely Rare Poster, Eden Theater, Tel Aviv, 1936

One of the rarest pieces in our collection that reflects Tel Aviv history and the iconic Eden Theater – a One-of-a-kind large poster for Charlie Chaplin’s Modern Times one of the most important films of the 20th century, produced for a 1936 screening at the legendary Eden Theater in Tel Aviv.

From the earliest days of Tel Aviv and into the decades that followed, neighborhood cinemas were one of the city’s most popular buildings,  social spaces that connected the young Hebrew city to global culture.

The first cinema in Tel Aviv, Eden, was founded in 1914 by Akiva Aryeh Weiss, one of the city’s architectural pioneers and a visionary Zionist. Located in Neve Tzedek, Eden quickly became a cultural cornerstone. During World War I, the Turks shut it down, fearing that its electric generator could aid enemy submarines. But under the British Mandate, the cinema reopened and stayed an iconic cultural center of Tel Aviv. It operated until 1974, and its building still stands today, preserved as a landmark of the city’s early history.