Clyde channels Blackmer display years ago

By Emily Ford

eford@salisburypost.com

Clyde is not the first artist in Salisbury to hang underwear in protest.

Suzanne Blackmer, the eccentric Broadway actress who lived at 112 S. Fulton St. until 1984, strung underwear and blankets between her home and the newly constructed Citizens Savings and Loan next door at the corner of Fulton and Innes streets.

“She said that the bank had taken down her fence when they built the new building, so she replaced it with a ‘new’ one,” Edward Norvell said in an e-mail.

Norvell, a local attorney and author, grew up in one of two houses torn down on the lot where the bank now stands.

Clyde, the artist formerly known as Clyde Overcash, taped men’s briefs to his store window July 21, allegedly because he didn’t like his neighbor. Anne Cave, executive director of the Rowan Arts Council, removed the underwear two days later and is charged with larceny.

Now, Clyde has more than a dozen boxers and briefs — all clean — hanging outside his antique shop at 114 E. Council St.

Blackmer’s display was dubbed the “spite fence.”

Clyde calls his “underwear alley.”

“It’s a 21st century spite fence,” said Davis Cooke, a local history buff and art dealer.

Like many in Salisbury’s art community, Cooke counts both Clyde and Cave as friends and hesitated to comment about the underwear incident.

For Cooke, Clyde and Blackmer fall into a treasured category of Salisbury residents — town characters.

“One of the things that makes this town more interesting to live in than other towns its size are these kinds of characters,” Davis said. “We don’t want to lose that.”

Clyde, who answers his phone “underwear incorporated,” received notice Wednesday from the city of Salisbury that his undergarment display violates code and requires a certificate of appropriateness.

Clyde declined to file an application.

He said when he complained to the city about the Salisbury Sculpture Show, arguing that it didn’t fit in the historic district, he was told “art does not need a certificate of appropriateness.”

If the city pursues the code violation for underwear alley, Clyde said he will use the same argument.

“Everyone says this is art,” Clyde said of his skivvy display. “Art does not need a certificate of appropriateness.”

Contact Emily Ford at 704-797-4264.

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