By Samuel Murray, The Daily Tar Heel | Oct 11, 2026 | Lifestyle
When José Manuel Cruz begins a piece, contrary to what he was taught, he rarely sketches it out beforehand.
“The sketch is in my head,” Cruz said. “As I start working on the canvas, whether it’s throwing down the colors, sometimes I let the canvases sit between one to three months before I actually really know what I’m going to do when it comes to the subject matter.”
One of Cruz’s pieces, “Racial Profiling,” was even on display in the Smithsonian’s Anacostia Community Museum. This piece is an interactive work that allows viewers to press a button to set off the sirens of a toy police car.
“The resulting siren sounds the immediate threat that racial profiling poses to urban communities,” the Smithsonian website states. “To emphasize that profiling does not single out a particular group, shadowboxes depict racially diverse portraits.”
About 100 of Cruz’s works are also on view closer to home at Nine Eighteen Nine Studio Gallery in Charlotte, through Oct. 17.
But one of José Manuel Cruz’s pieces can’t be found in a typical museum. Instead, it greets bus riders.
The work, titled “Cultural Dancers,” was installed this summer on an East Franklin Street bus shelter. Part of the Art + Transit program in Chapel Hill that aims to bring vibrancy to public spaces, it features two abstract dancers made of geometric patterns. As a Raleigh-based Colombian and Puerto Rican artist, Cruz wanted to break up the usual expectation of a bus stop advertisement with vibrant colors and bold black lines.
“Maybe it’ll brighten somebody’s day,” Cruz said. “Or at least maybe it’ll create a conversation and that’s kind of what you want.”
The piece is inspired by Cruz’s love for dancing and music. Cruz describes his technique as similar to Afro-Latin styles and defined by the colorful graffiti culture of New Jersey. He said he hopes the dancers’ sense of motion catches Chapel Hill residents’ eyes as they pass by.
“Maybe the design creates some type of movement that makes you want to look twice and makes you want to be like, ‘Oh wait, I see something different,’” Cruz said.
Steve Wright, public art coordinator for the Town of Chapel Hill, said the Art + Transit program started in 2018, and that the public art pieces help to reflect values of a community and aspects of a local scene.
“It gives a chance for local artists who live in and are part of the community to express themselves and share their talents with people in the community,” Wright said.
But Cruz has been making an impact in the community long before the Art + Transit program.
He attended Arts High School in north New Jersey, the first public visual and performing arts school in the country, and after two years of college, Cruz had the 60 credits required to be a substitute teacher for his former high school.
Taking one or two classes at a time in college, Cruz was a long-term substitute for more than 10 years, teaching Spanish, math and art before finally earning his degree.
Katie Wyatt, the executive director at Durham Arts Council and a colleague of Cruz’s, said that this kind of public art is integral to building a sense of community.
“We are in an ever-divided and farther and farther apart in terms of values and priorities as a society, and the arts are a way to bring people together,” Wyatt said. “It’s through the arts that we celebrate our joys and our sorrows.”
She also called Cruz a vital connector.
While Cruz’s latest work won’t be found at auction, perhaps it is better off serving a wider audience by bringing a little bit more color to Chapel Hill.