Luis de la Cruz y Ríos was the leading painter in the Canary Isles in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, and one of the most striking Spanish artists associated with King Ferdinand VII. He learned his craft from his father and from Juan de Miranda, Tenerife's most important artist. He lived the first forty years of his life on Tenerife, where he made a major name for himself as an artist while at the same time working as a teacher and holding various political offices. From 1810 to 1814 he taught at the School of Drawing associated with the Consulado del Mar ['Consulate of the Sea'] in the city of La Laguna, where he was also mayor from 1808 to 1814. At that time he worked mainly as a portrait artist. Indeed, this was the genre in which he specialised throughout his career. Those who sat for him included many of the local great and good, such as local cleric and leading neoclassical architect Diego Nicolás Eduardo (whose portrait hangs in the Diocesan Museum of Sacred Art in Las Palmas). For his portrait, Luis de la Cruz constructed a suitably sober, classical frame.

In 1815 he travelled to Madrid, and the following year was appointed honorary court painter. After that he produced several portraits of the king and his successive wives, and of numerous personages who moved in royal circles. Many of these portraits took the form of miniatures, a genre in which de la Cruz came to specialise and to enjoy great renown. His interest in miniatures was not just a matter of personal preference and skill but was also encouraged by the fact that the king and his court already had an extraordinarily able and prolific portrait artist in Vicente López. His paintings must be seen as a reference for understanding the style of Luis de la Cruz's work in Madrid.  On some occasions La Cruz was able to offer a more formal, iconographic alternative to López's style. Thus, Ferdinand VII and Queen Maria Christina strolling in the gardens of Aranjuez (1832, Fine Arts Museum of Oviedo) is one of the few pictures to show us a more private view of the king. Other works, such as his splendid Self-portrait in the Studio (c. 1825, held in a private collection in Madrid) is one of the most striking portraits to emerge from the time of Ferdinand VII.

Luis de la Cruz was highly regarded in official art circles, which led to his being awarded numerous Spanish and foreign distinctions. He was a Knight of the Order of the Golden Spur and he also held the Grand Cordon of the French Order of St Michael. Along with his career as an artist he also held official posts such as that of Customs Inspector in Seville, to which he was assigned in 1825. Nine years later he took up a similar post in Cadiz, but lost the job the following year when the Liberal government took office. From 1840 onwards he lived in Malaga, where he worked as a teacher. His pupils included Carlos de Haes.

Javier Portús