Rising Stars: Meet Erik Nicolaisen of Studio City

Today we’d like to introduce you to Erik Nicolaisen.

Hi Erik, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I’ve been painting murals since high school in Portland, Oregon. My best friend’s father owned a mural company, and he put us to work doing everything from coating out walls and cleaning brushes to assisting the artists on rickety suspended scaffolding. I was an artist myself, so the creative work appealed to me—but there was also something exhilarating about hanging off the sides of buildings that made me fall in love with the trade.
Life moved on, and I received a scholarship to play football at the University of Oregon, so mural work took a pause for a while. After graduation, I moved to Los Angeles, where I returned to the business, overseeing sales for my friend’s father’s company while continuing to assist with painting.

After a few years, I decided to focus full-time on my first love, acting. I continued working with the mural company whenever my schedule allowed, while acting became my primary source of income. By then, the company was essentially being run by my best friend.

In 2010, my best friend tragically died in a snowmobiling accident. I stepped in to help his father, who had moved to Central America, keeping the company moving forward and preserving the work his son had helped build. I managed the business for about a year, but eventually it became clear that we had different ideas about its future and how new business should be pursued.

That was a turning point for me. I decided that if I was going to continue in the mural business, I needed to build something of my own. In 2011, I formed an LLC, and Old City Artists was born.

The next eight months proved that decision was the right direction for me. Through a combination of relationships, persistence, diversification of projects, and a renewed focus on sales, I procured in several clients and began building the company from the ground up. What started as a way to keep a craft I loved alive ultimately became the beginning of Old City Artists—and, in many ways, the next chapter of my career.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
It hasn’t always been a smooth road, but some of the challenges I experienced early in my career taught me how important it is to recognize patterns and avoid repeating the same mistakes.
I lived through the economic downturn of 2007–2008, and I saw firsthand how quickly a slowdown in consumer spending could affect outdoor advertising. I realized that if my company was going to weather the next downturn, we couldn’t depend too heavily on any one segment of the market.

So we made diversification a priority. My team began building relationships with design firms, developers, and city governments—clients who have an ongoing need for hand-painted murals and signage, but whose projects aren’t necessarily tied to consumer spending and advertising budgets.

That strategy was put to the test when COVID-19 hit. Outdoor advertising slowed dramatically for many companies, but because we had diversified our business, we were able to stay busy with large development projects and city beautification work.

There have certainly been difficult periods along the way, but each one has reinforced the same lesson for me: build a business that can adapt. You can’t always control what happens in the economy, but you can control how prepared you are when it does.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
Old City Artists was initially known for large-scale photorealism, which grew directly out of our background in outdoor advertising. We developed the ability to reproduce highly detailed, photorealistic imagery at an enormous scale—and to do it quickly and under budget. Today, our team is made up of some of the finest mural painters and studio artists in the country, and we take tremendous pride in the quality of what we produce.

But I think what really sets us apart is our attitude. We have a genuine “can-do” mentality. We’re constantly expanding what we’re capable of so that we can solve problems for our clients rather than simply telling them what we do and don’t do. Over the years, that has taken us well beyond advertising murals and photorealism into hand-painted signage, industrial coatings, mural design, and many other specialized projects.

Just as importantly, I wanted to build a different kind of company culture. I’ve always believed that being a great artist and being a great professional should go hand in hand. We hire good people, we work with good clients, and we treat both relationships as something worth protecting. Our goal is to make the process as enjoyable and professional as the finished product.

I also believe strongly in being present. I’m not an absentee owner. When we’re on a job, I’m there representing our clients and making sure the work meets the standard they expect. After all these years, I still get a lot of satisfaction from being on the wall, solving problems, talking with clients, and watching a project come together.

Ultimately, I’m most proud that we’ve built a company that combines an unusually high level of artistic ability with professionalism, adaptability, and a genuine commitment to our clients. We want people to remember not only what we painted, but what it was like to work with us.

Is there something surprising that you feel even people who know you might not know about?
Something that surprises people is that before Old City Artists became my full-time focus, I spent years pursuing acting and playing football at the University of Oregon on a scholarship.
In some ways, those experiences have had a bigger influence on how the company is run than people might realize. Football taught me accountability, teamwork, and how to perform under pressure. Acting taught me preparation, 100% investment, and understand that how you present something can be just as important as what you create.

I never really planned for those chapters of my life to lead me into running a mural company. But looking back, they all seem to have prepared me for it. At the end of the day, I’m still an artist, but I’ve also learned that building a successful creative business requires an unusual combination of creativity, discipline, teamwork, and grit.

Pricing:

• no. Wall pricing is usually determined by mural complexity and size. Add factors like wall access, travel costs, and type of materials, and every job is unique.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.oldcityartists.com
• Instagram: @oldcityartists
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erik-nicolaisen-34697593