Untitled drawing from Floyd, with a stylized western theme featuring three men on horseback in a circular motif.
Cowboys Cavorting…
May 18, 2025
The Cognoscente’s Pets
May 16, 2025
This drawing is unlabeled (unless someone can interpret the title‐‐ FOXES maybe?), but a very similar drawing is labeled The Cognoscente’s Pets. It may have been a study for this drawing, but it suffered some water damage. This version has added elements: the child(?) next to one woman’s skirts and the Japanese lettering.
These elegant Asian-styled characters, the cognoscenti, are featured in about two dozen of Floyd’s drawings. More cognoscenti can be found in this post.
Three Maids Jogging by the Sea
May 14, 2025
Another in the “joggers” series, which contains about 40 different drawings.
Three maids jogging
….. by the sea
Doffing toggery…..
taking tea
The Less You Pay…
May 12, 2025
A Floyd saying: “The less you pay for something the more it costs.”
Ennui… and the Pursuit of Happiness
May 10, 2025
“Ennui,” above, with its profusion of images, is one of Floyd’s more enigmatic drawings. Be sure to click to enlarge and check out the detail of the left border.
A second, more colorful version of this drawing carries the words “…and the Pursuit of Happiness.” The latter was a small theme of Floyd’s, and we’ll see more examples of it in future posts.
Into the Jaws of…
May 8, 2025
Untitled drawing.
Seems timely!
Some ladies vie for the priesthood
Some e’en for a bishopric hope
Some make a living
Suppressing misgiving that
Some day one will be Pope
Man of the Woods
April 16, 2025
Poetry by Floyd: Man of the Woods
The orangutan like all his kind
has no tail on his behind
Ripe and rotten figs his ration
Knows he naught of constipation
Orang wives of orange hue
Orang aunts and uncles too
Live in lofty jungle trees
Droppings drop with rural ease
Passersby below them wonder
What the dickens they are under
Floyd’s title here is a literal translation of the Indonesian word orangutan, orang (person) –utan (of the woods or forest). It’s one of few Indonesian words used in English. But see Wikipedia for detailed etymology.
One for Zachary
April 15, 2025
Lady with a Dragon
Floyd’s works reflect his admiration for the styles of artists from Japan and China, and he used similar styles in several of his drawings.
Suzuki Harunobu (c. 1725 – 8 July 1770) was a Japanese designer of woodblock print art in the ukiyo-e style, an innovator, the first to produce full-color prints (nishiki-e) in 1765, rendering obsolete the former modes of two- and three-color prints. From Wikipedia.
Katsushika Hokusai (c. 31 October 1760 – 10 May 1849), known as Hokusai, was a Japanese ukiyo-e artist of the Edo period, active as a painter and printmaker. From Wikipedia.
Floyd R. Peterson 
Written
on April 19, 2025