Alice Austen’s Larky Life

Austen’s trajectory, like that of many artists in New York, finally hinged on the vicissitudes of real estate. At Clear Comfort, she built an existence of remarkable self-determination—for thirty years, she lived there alongside Tate, with whom she’d fallen in love during a vacation in the Catskills. (One giddy series of photos depicts a young Tate dancing outside in the sun.) But Austen’s family money was lost in the crash of 1929, and she and Tate, after struggling to support themselves, were obliged to sell off many of their possessions—including a collection of shells, lending a bittersweet edge to the current show’s title. In 1944, they sold the house. Tate eventually moved in with her family, who rejected Austen; Austen moved to the Staten Island Farm Colony, a pauper’s hospital.

A former Life magazine writer rediscovered Austen’s work in 1951, and a new surge of interest and support restored her to a measure of ease, before her death in 1952. Clear Comfort was preserved thanks to the efforts of Austen’s new fans (including the photographer Berenice Abbott). It operated for a time as a fairly conventional historic-house museum: the roped-off rooms held an assortment of roughly period furniture, with little that was specific to Austen’s life there. The house’s official accounts elided her relationship with Tate, inspiring the activist group the Lesbian Avengers to stage a protest outside of it in the nineties. In 2017, though, it was named a National L.G.B.T.Q. Historic Site, and today it foregrounds Tate as an essential part of Austen’s story.