We recently connected with Erick Cruz and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Erick thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

Drawing was something I was always able to do. I spent a lot of time sketching, starting at a young age with popular cartoon and video game characters, and then moving on to portraiture around the high school years. I just love people and its always been my very favorite thing to capture someone’s energy in my small way through my portraits. This was always just a hobby, though – something i could do on the side for fun and for love. I never in my whole life it would be something viable, or that would be in good demand.

Sometime about 5 years ago, I was pushed towards my art in a big way. I was stuck between a rock and a hard place. My car had broken down and I had no options to get to work to make my income for regular expenses, much less to repair it. I offered to draw a couple of portraits to make some money, and that became the catalyst for my business! I felt the universe literally compel me to follow this path because one sell led to another and another and another. Five years later, im still selling my art full time!

This was how I began, but I attached my own energy and personality to my journey in a big way. My intense love for people translates to the art tributes I create, Now I spend a lot of my energy creating memorials for the people that mean the most to us . . . . the ones that we lost, the ones that inspire us, creating momentos to the souls that increase our quality of life. Its been a blessing to do this and people’s appreciation for it is what keeps me going.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

In Peace Portraits – I deliver loved ones into the moment through my illustrations and live music!

My focus is on creating custom colored pencil art for homes. I work from my clients’ reference photos to render the likenesses of their favorite people, their beloved pets, their icons and favorite bands, landscapes of their homes for nostalgia . . . really anything that the client could imagine, i sketch the image.

I often am given a single photograph to recreate by hand. I can also make collages of various photos, sometimes adding people in a group picture when they weren’t there to join the photograph. One of my favorite offerings is what I call the time-warp portrait, which is really just an age progression image of a person in various stages of their life – which is especially touching for parents.

One of my very favorite things to do is to draw musicians! Music is a hugely motivating aspect of my life, and I love paying tribute to both my favorite megastars as well as my favorite local ones! You can extremely often find me at a live music performance with my drawing kit, and ill sit there and create my work while I am also vibing, grooving, and headbanging to the energy of a gig! I like to think that the musicians are lending their very powerful energy into my work, and even going so far to say that the spirit of the subject of my drawing is enjoying the show as well!

I put a lot of love into these pieces and offer them framed. Its my very main hope that the art is displayed and enjoyed for many, many years going forward.

How did you build your audience on social media?

I’m actually very excited and proud of this endeavor! It’s been one of the coolest things I’ve ever experienced!

Being a portrait artist who draws my favorite people, i have taken it upon myself to create special portraiture for my most favorite superstars that come through town! This started a little over a decade ago when I learned that Ozzy Osbourne was coming to the area for a book signing. Ozzy has been a personal hero of mine through my whole life, and the meaning and message of his lyrics have deeply embedded into me. I found it had to be not only very appropriate, but also totally possible to make a personal tribute to him, something that would have a profound touch to him personally, and be able to deliver it to him in person at the event. Sure enough, I was able to hand one of my life’s greatest heroes one of my large portraits of his family. He loved it! Ive been riding the high of that experience and the notion that he may have my art displayed somewhere, and have continued to do this for several other celebrities. Ive managed to get my art tributes to George Foreman, Weird Al Yankovic, The Decemberists, Zakk Wylde, and Jack Black! I am still looking for opportunities to “reach for the stars”!!

So everytime I create one of these pieces I can share the experience through social media, most especially through fan pages. My online presence has been building bit by bit in that sense! I feel though that I could be waiting for that big break . . . when Im not just the artist looking to touch these famous personalities, but that they will one day be the one seeking me and my art out!!

My advice for anyone working to build their social media presence is to be proud and happy to connect! I find that engaging with people regularly and showcasing your work consistently is a good way to let people know that you are active and prepared to serve them. The more work you do and share means the more and more eyes on it, so don’t be afraid to really put yourself on blast!

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

This question is important to me because its certainly the case that work picks up and slows down. I think any business owner will attest to the fact that things get very hard and even discouraging when business drops. For artists especially, I believe those are the times when many consider slowing down themselves or even quitting altogether just to focus their energy on things that are more viable.

In my case, its been difficult to quit my art business in favor of something more regular and even more lucrative. I have 2 children I’ve been raising through my art journey, and Ive discovered years ago when I started, that running my art business has allowed me to ALWAYS be present for my kids. I am always the one to drop them off at school and pick them up after. I never have to leave them with a daycare or a sitter while I work because I can either create from my home studio while they keep themselves occupied, or bring my art out to any outing where they can have fun and play while I watch them, sitting and working. This benefit has kept me extremely motivated to stay with the art journey, even when things are going very slow. At this point in my business after these five years, I am lucky and blessed enough to reach out to my client/fan/follower/friend base to offer more work when I really need it. These are the motivations that keep me pushing to create my tributes to the ones that mean most to us.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: instagram.com/in_peace_portraits
• Facebook: facebook.com/inpeaceportraits