- My work relies on a kind of subconscious sort of dream logic.

And the way I explain it, I always use the same example, it would be like this, this is dream logic in a nutshell.

"Oh, Sandy, yeah, I saw you this morning and you were a chihuahua."

That's the logic of a dream.

- Yeah, how many times have we said, "It was you, but it wasn't you"?

- Yeah, it was my house, but it wasn't my house.

I was driving that car, but it wasn't my car.

It's like that is the way my entire way of constructing my world works.

It's like, it is this, but it's simultaneously something else.

(gentle instrumental music) - [Sandy] The art of Fred Stonehouse is influenced by images.

Images from his past, images from his peers, images from his dreams, which he describes as, "Messed up."

- I definitely tap into my dream life, which is terrifying.

I've always said I'm an artist who's driven by images.

I've always found images really, really compelling.

- [Sandy] Stonehouse's art is different, it's not for everyone.

He says so himself.

- You know, like any person, though, I'll look at things I make and I'll be like, "Oof, that's rough."

I mean, not bad, it's interesting to me, and maybe powerful, and maybe even beautiful in its own weird way, but I'll think, this is not gonna be for the average bearer.

I mean, that's true for pretty much almost everything I make.

- [Sandy] His work is dark and mysterious, self-deprecating, heavily satirical, edgy.

- I refuse to make a thing with no edge.

In fact, that's when I'll get upset.

If I look at a thing, I'm like, "This has no edge."

Then I gotta keep working on it.

You know, honestly, this painting's been kind of bugging me.

I'm gonna work back into this, I think this guy needs a tongue.

(drill whirring) This guy's been on the wall for a while (drill whirring) and I've been looking at that wall.

I'm like, "Yeah, I kinda like that, but not that guy."

He needs something coming out of his mouth.

He's just too static, he's got no edge.

And let's see if that even gives it enough of a shift.

Now with this extra little appendage, his tongue sticking out of his mouth, just that subtle difference of it kinda coming out and down, now it's formally echoing the tears and somehow it makes this good triangle with the ears.

Again, just wanting it to have just that little bit of edge to it.

- [Sandy] On this episode of "The Arts Page", we explore the unabashed and surreal world of Fred Stonehouse.

(gentle instrumental music) (gentle instrumental music) Stonehouse grew up on the northwest side of Milwaukee.

His family was working class.

- I was always painting and drawing.

- [Sandy] They played an integral role in shaping his artistic vision and eclectic personality.

(gentle instrumental music) Was there any creativity in your family?

- Oh, yeah.

Yeah, my dad drew, my mom drew and wrote really awful poetry.

My siblings, all except one, there were five of us, all of them had some creative, like, visual art ability, though nobody took it like seriously, you know?

It was just a thing everybody loved to do.

It was absolutely just for pleasure.

- [Sandy] Even though he loved art, particularly painting and drawing, Stonehouse didn't see a future in it.

Out of high school, he decided to go to trade school to become an auto mechanic.

- My senior year in high school, I became part of the industrial cooperative education program where they send you out into the world for half the day.

And I left school at noon, but then I worked till 8:00 at night and the job just sucked.

I just thought, you know, I'd rather be painting.

- [Sandy] After realizing that fixing cars wasn't the path for him, Stonehouse followed his passion and switched to art school.

It was a decision that came with a catch.

- I decided to lie to my parents.

I couldn't bring myself to tell my parents that I was gonna go to school for art.

Somehow, coming from a working class family, it just seemed like such a completely irresponsible thing to do.

I lied and I told them that I was studying architecture.

But I was just so concerned that they would be, I don't know, embarrassed or try to pressure me out of it, I didn't want to hear the arguments against it.

And I didn't tell them, I don't think they knew I was an art student until my third year in art school.

- Interesting that creativity was so accepted in your family, - Oh yeah.

- yet you kept it from them for over two years.

- They were not the kind of family that'd be like, "That's great, you're doing something you love."

It was like, "If you don't do it really well, just don't even bother."

- "I've seen your paintings" - Yeah.

- "I don't think you should go to art school" or "You really need art school."

- Yeah, right, exactly.

I think it would've been just like, "You're just gonna fail in art school.

You're good at fixing cars, just stick with that."

So I was too deeply into it by the time I let them know.

And then of course, you know, one year outta school, I got my first show in Chicago, and you know, it's just been rolling ever since.

- [Sandy] That art show was a huge success, and it came time for Stonehouse to make a decision, leave Milwaukee for a bigger city with more opportunity or stay and develop his skills and style here.

He chose to stay.

- The decision to stay in Milwaukee was really an important one for me.

As a young man, of course, everybody at the time, and I think probably still to this day, is in a hurry to run off to Los Angeles, New York, Berlin, wherever.

But I really thought that was required, that you had to go to a big city, you had to go someplace that had an art audience, even though I knew that Milwaukee had its own art audience.

- [Sandy] Milwaukee molded and shaped who he is.

This is his home and this is where he's comfortable.

- For me, I require a certain amount of comfort.

I need to be in a comfortable space to be creative.

You know, I'm a fan of Milwaukee, it's home, it's where I'm comfortable, and it's where I can get work done.

(gentle instrumental music) I'm gonna put this on the side and I'm gonna start on, I've been having this thought about making really simple just things on some of these kind of collage pieces of paper.

Just dumb, simple things.

But I had this thought that I wanted to make, I don't know, a milk jug.

- [Sandy] For the last 20 years, Stonehouse has taught at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

- I teach at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and it changes a little bit, but I mostly teach drawing and painting.

I dunno if it's gonna be more of a milk jug or like a liquor bottle, I'll see when I get to it.

I used to joke and say, "I don't teach anything, I just hang out with artists all day."

Which is true, but that's a type of teaching.

I didn't start teaching till I was 46, so I had to had done 26 years in the studio by myself.

This is what happens after I get close to finishing a body of work and you work in a certain way, you just get restless to work a different way.

And then when I came to teaching, it was such a gift to me to be able to, like, share all these things I had learned.

Now I realize all the stuff I do organically that's really important to them that I didn't even think of as teaching.

- [Sandy] For Stonehouse, we are all parts of a whole, many things throughout our lives influence who we are.

He realizes this, accepts it, and incorporates it into his art.

- I'm the product of all the things I'm interested in and I love.

I look at art a lot, and I talk to my students about this a lot, that wanting to emulate another artist or like really admiring another artist, when you have so much empathy for another artist's work, there's this recognition that happens when you see a thing that you love that much when you're an artist, the way I am.

And so you feel compelled to make your own version.

And of course, you fail to make that thing.

I am interested in form sometimes, it's sometimes the most sort of mundane form that, you know, can be sort of interesting just abstractly.

Somewhere in that space between wanting to have made that thing and the thing you actually make is where you discover your own voice, I think.

But you can be inspired by that thing, attempt to make that thing, and then your thing is informed by all of your own experiences and that covetousness, that love of that other thing.

And it just emerges, hopefully, as your own unique vocabulary, your own voice.

Like I said, I just had this thought that I wanted to do these kind of big, just simple, dumb forms.

I don't even drink milk.

(gentle instrumental music) Oh, smudged it.

It's okay, that can be fixed.

- [Sandy] Stonehouse doesn't like to classify his art into any one genre or any one style, such as surrealism or baroque.

- If I make a thing and I'm like, "Ooh, that's a good thing," that's the best I can do, because I have no way of knowing or predicting how anybody else is gonna receive it.

The thing I can know is how it affects me.

And I think all artists are like that, you make your art for yourself.

- So you're saying your expression - Yeah.

- and if people connect with or appreciate your expression, - Yeah.

- that's where the remuneration comes.

- That's right.

That's a great, great benefit if that happens.

And I've been very lucky.

So, you know, knock wood, it's been very easy for me because I've been lucky in all sorts of ways.

I wanna modify that a little bit, because I do think that communication with an audience is part of the equation.

You do want to have an audience.

There's a few things that are essential to being an artist, I think.

One is having the time and space to make the work.

Then it's important to have sort of a support network, people who believe in you, and it could be other artists, your family, whoever.

And maybe this last part is sometimes your community, sometimes not, an audience.

But, you know, if you have those three things, you're good to go.

There's a bunch of us at school, years ago, we were at the bar, a bunch of painting faculty, and somehow this idea came up of ways, because we were talking about students, and like, paintings that are just shot, like, what do you tell 'em how to fix it?

So we actually came up with a list of like quick fixes for bad paintings.

Of course, people were contributing all sorts of ideas, like, "Oh, paint polka dots on it," "Put stripes on it," "Add rectangles," you know, whatever, "Paint it green," whatever.

They were all preposterous, everybody was drunk.

And of course, one of mine was, like, put a skull in the middle of it.

And I found over the years that that is a dead sure way to fix any painting.

It doesn't matter what else is going on, you stick a skull in the middle of, it's pretty much fixed.

(gentle instrumental music) - [Sandy] Stonehouse lives his life according to his own principles.

He has a strong set of unique values and morals.

- I have always been prepared to suffer the consequences of my decisions.

Like, for instance, I always used to joke and say, "If the decision to be an artist means I end up having to live under a bridge, I'm prepared for that."

- [Sandy] He values his independence.

- I've never been good with authority, it's like the primary value for creative people is freedom.

If you don't have that freedom when you're working, you're screwed.

- [Sandy] And trusts his intuitions.

- An old friend of mine just said, "You know, Fred, as an artist, all you can do is he just run your flag up and you pray to God somebody salutes."

And I thought, that's pretty much it.

You just do your thing and then you hope for the best.

- He doesn't care about the material things, he just loves art and wants to make the world a more interesting place.

What is this motivation?

Where does it come from?

- I care about being able to live a life that feels meaningful.

And as an artist, there's only one way to do that, and that's being authentic, I think.

- He's as authentic a person as they come.

(gentle instrumental music) (gentle instrumental music) Thanks for watching "The Arts Page".

Please like, subscribe, and turn on notifications for more stories of art in our community.

(gentle instrumental music)