Floyd MacMillan Davis (April 8, 1896 – October 25, 1966) was an American painter and illustrator known for his work in advertising and illustration; Walter and Roger Reed described him as "someone who could capture the rich, beautiful people of the 1920s: dashing, mustachioed men; the cool, svelte women. But Davis was just as capable at capturing just-plain-folk, and with a cartoonist's sensibilities and a fresh humor, he expanded into story art and ad work that called characters of every persuasion.
By the early 1940s, he was recognized as the top man in both fields. In 1943, Life Magazine called him the "#1 Illustrator in America".
Early career and marriage (1896–1925) Floyd MacMillan Davis was born on April 8, 1896, and grew up in Chicago. His ancestors were Scottish and Welsh. Floyd never had the benefit of art school instruction because he was forced by circumstance to quit high school at the end of his first year, after which, he got a job in a lithograph house in Chicago. For $3.00 a week he made tusche and did every kind of manual work entrusted to an apprentice. He was brought into contact with art and was given some opportunity to develop his own drawing skill. His first real art job was with Meyer Both & Co., the well-known Chicago Art Service.
His art career, interrupted by two and a half years of service in the U.S. Navy during World War I, was resumed when he returned to Chicago and joined the Grauman Brothers' organization as an advertising artist. An early exponent of the drybrush technique, he had broken away before 1920 from the usual pen-and-ink drawings. His illustrations appeared in many magazines, including Collier’s, The Saturday Evening Post and Redbook.
Davis' early career was almost derailed by love. He returned from World War I duty to work at Grauman Brothers, Chicago. When a woman artist was hired, Davis was so distracted, that the woman had to be let go. The woman was Gladys Rockmore, and she and Davis were married in 1925.
Advertising and illustration (1926–1941) He had left the studio and was now a freelance advertising artist. The following year, the couple moved to New York City where Floyd, dividing his time between advertising and magazine illustration, soon became the top man in both fields. Then, art editors had to compete with art directors of advertising agencies for his drawings. He became an accomplished illustrator for magazines like Woman's Home Companion, American Magazine, and a long run at the Saturday Evening Post. He did advertisements for most of the major ad firms with clients like Texaco, Johnnie Walker, Eveready, Desoto, Real Silk, Nabisco, Grape Nuts, Caterpillar Inc. and Hiram Walker.
Floyd & Gladys moved to New York City and set up house-keeping in the old Sherwood Studios. On December 15, 1928, and February 1, 1930, respectively, Noel Montgomery Davis and Deborah Davis, their son and daughter made their appearance.
In 1932 (at the height of the Great Depression), they decided to go abroad for a year to Cannes, France, near a Renoir enclave.
In the thirties, Davis began to illustrate stories of humbler subjects. His pictures of southern rural and hill people for such authors as William Faulkner, Sigman Byrd, Glenn Allan, and MacKinlay Kantor became immensely popular. He loved these assignments and filled the pictures not only with a fascinating cast of individuals, but added the special Davis touches: a cat crouched in the corner ready to leap out at a rival, a fly on an old mans heat, a small lizard hiding behind a tree. None of these details intruded on the picture story itself they are there for the perceptive viewer to discover. Readers responded enthusiastically; his pictures were admired as much as the stories themselves.
The family moved in a social milieu which included luminaries in all the arts such as Ernest Hemingway, Dr. Thomas Mann, George Gershwin, Leonard Bernstein, and the puppeteer Bil Baird. They lived at 1 West 67th Street, known as the Hotel Des Artistes, later home of the famous Café des Artistes, where other artists such as Stuart Davis, Leopold Seyffert and LeRoy Neiman resided.
World War II artist (1942–1945) At the start of 1942, Floyd Davis was featured in the January edition of American Artist. In 1942, Life Magazine sent Floyd Davis to Bermuda as a war correspondent to cover preparations for World War II. He completed nine paintings, one of which was used for the double page spread at the center of the magazine.
In 1943, Life called Floyd Davis the "#1 illustrator in America".