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Clara Tice (22 May 1888 – 2 February 1973) was an American
avant-garde The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...
illustrator and artist, who spent most of her life in
New York City, United States New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
. Because of her provocative art and public appearances, she was seen as representative of bohemian
Greenwich Village Greenwich Village ( , , ) is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street to the north, Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the south, and the Hudson River to the west. Greenwich Village ...
and thus known as "The Queen of Greenwich Village."


Early life

According to herself and ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', in 1908 Tice was the first woman in Greenwich Village to bob her hair. Around the same time, Tice was able to study under the famous artist and teacher
Robert Henri Robert Henri (; June 24, 1865 – July 12, 1929) was an American painter and teacher. As a young man, he studied in Paris, where he identified strongly with the Impressionists, and determined to lead an even more dramatic revolt against A ...
. In 1910, Henri and some of his artist friends, organized the first exhibition of Independent Artist. This art show, which was with its jury-free and no-awards concept quite a revolution at that time and thus received enormous attention, was financially backed by Tice and featured her works.


Immersion in the arts

A few years later, namely in 1915, Tice's fame skyrocketed when
Anthony Comstock Anthony Comstock (March 7, 1844 – September 21, 1915) was an anti-vice activist, United States Postal Inspector, and secretary of the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice (NYSSV), who was dedicated to upholding Christian morality. He o ...
, main founder of the
Society for the Suppression of Vice The Society for the Suppression of Vice, formerly the Proclamation Society Against Vice and Immorality, or simply Proclamation Society, was a 19th-century English society dedicated to promoting public morality. It was established in 1802, based o ...
, tried to confiscate Tice's art at the well-known bohemian restaurant Polly's. Thereafter images of Tice's artworks and photos of the artist were featured in magazines such as '' Vanity Fair, Rogue,
The Blind Man ''The Blind Man'' was an art and Dada journal published briefly by the New York Dadaists in 1917. History Henri-Pierre Roché and Marcel Duchamp, visiting from France, organized the magazine with Beatrice Wood in New York City. Mina Loy also c ...
,'' and ''
Cartoons magazine ''CARtoons magazine'' is an American publication that focuses on automotive humor and hot rod artwork. Originated by Carl Kohler and drag-racing artist Pete Millar, it was published by Robert E. Petersen Publication Company as a quarterly startin ...
''. During that time she had several one-person exhibitions and also worked on numerous other projects, for example, she created posters for bohemian costume balls and played herself in the 1922 version of the ''Greenwich Village Follies''. During those years, Tice not only played an important part in Greenwich Village's colorful art scene, but also joined the Arensberg Circle in their uptown location. It was probably
Marcel Duchamp Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, , ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. Duchamp is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso ...
who introduced Tice to Walter and Louise Arensberg and their salon. There she met
Henri-Pierre Roché Henri-Pierre Roché (28 May 1879 – 9 April 1959) was a French author who was involved with the artistic avant-garde in Paris and the Dada movement. Late in life, Roché published two novels: his first was ''Jules et Jim'' (1953), a semi-autobiog ...
, with whom she spent several evenings. Tice also participated in two projects by the Arensberg Circle: first, two of her works were shown in the first exhibition of the
Society of Independent Artists Society of Independent Artists was an association of American artists founded in 1916 and based in New York. Background Based on the French Société des Artistes Indépendants, the goal of the society was to hold annual exhibitions by avant-gard ...
and second, one of her works was featured in ''The Blind Man''. During the 1920s, she illustrated about a dozen books with her erotic images, these are nowadays expensive collector's items. In 1940, her own book called ''ABC Dogs'' was published. It is a children's book in which each letter of the alphabet is represented by a dog breed whose name starts with the same letter. This publication sparked renewed interest in Tice and her art. She also worked on her memoirs, which she never completed.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tice, Clara 1888 births 1973 deaths American illustrators 20th-century American artists Avant-garde art Dada 20th-century American women artists Artists from New York City American women illustrators