Object Details
- Exhibition Label
- Lillian Gish never had the aura of glamour that other early Hollywood leading ladies enjoyed, and many actresses surpassed her as box office draws. Nevertheless, Gish may well deserve pride of place as the most capable actress of the silent-screen era, and her performances in such films as Broken Blossoms and The Scarlet Letter number among the most memorable moments of early American filmmaking. The movie with which Gish is perhaps most often associated is director D. W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation, the movie industry's first feature-length drama, released in 1915.
- In this photograph by Alfred Cheney Johnston, Gish is dressed for her role in Orphans of the Storm, the last of her many films made with Griffith. After the movie's completion, Griffith urged her to go to other moviemakers for parts because he could not pay her what she was worth.
- Data Source
- National Portrait Gallery
- Artist
- Alfred Cheney Johnston, 08 Apr 1885 - 17 Apr 1971
- Sitter
- Lillian Gish, 14 Oct 1893 - 27 Feb 1993
- Date
- 1922
- Credit Line
- National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
- Medium
- Gelatin silver print
- Dimensions
- Image: 33.1 × 25.5 cm (13 1/16 × 10 1/16")
- Sheet: 34 × 26.3 cm (13 3/8 × 10 3/8")
- Mat: 71.1 × 55.9 cm (28 × 22")
- Type
- Photograph
