Artist tipped gracious host (4)
I believe the answer is:
army
'host' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'artist tipped gracious' is the wordplay.
'artist' becomes 'ra' (Royal Academician, member of Royal Academy of Arts).
'tipped' says the letters should be written in reverse.
'gracious' becomes 'my' (I've seen this in other clues).
'ra' back-to-front is 'ar'.
'ar'+'my'='ARMY'
(Other definitions for army that I've seen before include "Vast number" , "fighters" , "Land-fighting force" , "Military land force" , "Multitude" .)