Silver print photograph, 7 3/8 x 9 3/8, of silent screen star Jane Novak. Hoover Art Co, LA photogrpaher’s imprint.
Jane Novak in 1896, and in 1913 her aunt, actress Anne Schaefer, invited her to California. She appeared in a movie on her first day in Southern California, before there was a film studio in Hollywood. Novak endured as a performer, in part, by sacrificing sensational roles for roles as leading women in more wholesome films. She was considered an "old-fashioned girl"  She played opposite Wallace Beery, Tom Mix, Hobart Bosworth, Alan Hale, Thomas Moore, and Lewis Stone. At one time, she was engaged to marry Western star William S. Hart, but their marriage never took place. She made five films with Hart. Novak's movies often were based on outdoor stories. Some of these include Treat 'Em Rough (1919), Kazan (1921), Isobel (1920), The River's End (1920), and The Rosary (1922). By March 1922, she had her own company and was under contract for five outdoor movies, with a salary at $1,500 per week. Aside from Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks, Sr., Novak was the first film star to paid in four figures for a single movie. At this time, performers were only paid while a movie was shooting. An entire film was completed in three or four weeks. Novak's last starring role was opposite Richard Dix in the Technicolor production Redskin (1929). The movie was supposed to be with sound, but there was a contract dispute involving this being Dix's final film with Paramount Pictures, so it was shot as a silent film. Novak's voice was good, but she made only a handful of pictures following the advent of sound. Jane Novak died in Woodland Hills, California of a stroke in 1990 at the age of 94.
Hoover Art Co.  was one of LA's earliest portrait studios and was instrumental in the early days of Hollywood's film industry. The studio, located on Hollywood Boulevard was founded by Frank Sheridan Hoover in the early 1900s, and was known for its portrait photography and revolutionized the art by using unique lighting and techniques to make photos look like paintings. It was a prominent studio for leading citizens and is also credited with luring the first film studio to Hollywood.
 
Had been signed and inscribed, however had been framed and the exposure to light has largely faded the ink. The image however has retained good tonality and clarity.