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Otto Schroeder was founder of Schroeder Funeral Home in Madison. In 1959, the Schroeder family sold the home to UW Madison's artist-in-residence Aaron Bohrod. He lived there with his wife Ruth until his death until 1992. Bohrod hired architect Herbert Fritz to design the artist studio that was built over the existing garage.
2004 - addition added to the back of the house.
2018 - The two-and-one-half-story, wood-frame, Tudor Revival-style house has stone foundation and an irregular rectangular plan that includes three front-gable projecting wings on the front (east), rear (west), and side (south) elevations. It has an irregular side-gable roof with three hip-roof dormers; one opens to a small integrated balcony toward the north end of the front (east) facade. Exterior walls are clad in a combination of stucco and stone masonry and many wall surfaces display false half-timbering. Fenestration consists of multi-light windows and replacement fixed-frame windows. A stone chimney is located near the southern end of the house. The 1932 house was designed by renowned Madison architect Frank Riley, who specialized in revival styles, for Otto Schroeder, a prominent Madison funeral director, and his wife Louise.
Artist Aaron Bohrod purchased the house in 1959 and served as artist-in-residence at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1948 to 1973. Bohrod studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and received many awards for his early paintings, prints, and drawings. During World War II he was an artist correspondent for Life Magazine and the U.S. Department of Army. In 1948 he came to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he developed a unique “trompe l’oeil” (fool the eye) technique whereby painted objects appear very realistic. The Art Institute of Chicago, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art all have Bohrod’s works in their collections. Bohrod added many fanciful nature images to the interior of the main house, including fish forms on the vestibule and bird forms on the kitchen cupboards. In 1959 Bohrod commissioned renowned architect Herbert Fritz to design a free-standing art studio on the property, northeast of the main house. The side-gable studio features exterior walls clad in stucco, wood, and stone; distinctive inverted triangular window openings, as well as a wood-frame window wall on the north elevation; and four basement-level garage bays on the east elevation.
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Artist Aaron Bohrod Shows Off New Studio
July 8, 1960
University of Wisconsin Artist-in-Residence Aaron Bohrod shows his new studio at his English Tudor style home at 4811 Tonyawatha Trail overlooking Lake Monona. The studio was designed by Herbert Fr...
Artist Aaron Bohrod Shows Off New Studio
July 8, 1960
University of Wisconsin Artist-in-Residence Aaron Bohrod shows his new studio at his English Tudor style home at 4811 Tonyawatha Trail overlooking Lake Monona. The studio was designed by Herbert Fr...
Aaron Bohrod in his Studio
Caption with image reads: "Aaron Bohrod, pictured here in his studio, is the established American master of trompe l'oeil ('fool the eye') painting. This is the technique used in the seven original...
Artist Aaron Bohrod Shows Off New Studio
July 8, 1960
University of Wisconsin Artist-in-Residence Aaron Bohrod shows his new studio at his English Tudor style home at 4811 Tonyawatha Trail overlooking Lake Monona. The studio was designed by Herbert Fr...




