8x10" high quality art print in 11x14" white mat.
 
Merlino Arts Center - Grand Cinema Tacoma 
The Merlino Arts Center is housed in a grand building constructed in 1925 by the Tacoma Odd Fellows Lodge.  It was repurposed into an arts center that now is home to Tacoma City Ballet, Corina Bakery, the Grand Cinema and artists lofts to name a few.  The Grand Cinema opened as a non-profit in 1997. This member owned movie theatre specializes in showing independent, foreign and local films. Two movies with Tacoma connections filmed in 1925 and 1926 respectively, are Charlie Chaplin's “The Gold Rush” and “Eyes of the Totem”. Chaplin wrote, starred in and directed “The Gold Rush” and in the steamship scene near the end of the movie, there is a life preserver in the background with the word TACOMA on it. "Eyes of the Totem" was filmed in and around Tacoma by local Weaver Studios and was recently rediscovered in a film archive. The film is a unique and campy portrayal of Tacoma from 1926 and shows many historic views of the city.