Royal Oak hair salon was created as a space to help spread creative expression. One way we foster that is by working with local artists and providing them with a space to exhibit their work.

Zoë LeBlanc de Smith (b. 1994, Kalamazoo USA) is a Barcelona-based painter whose work pulses with rhythm, texture, and electric intimacy. Working often alla prima (wet on wet), she paints portraits of friends and acquaintances under artificial, neon-lit conditions, capturing fleeting expressions with thick, confident strokes that seem to vibrate off the canvas.

Her brushwork is both musical and muscular, orchestrating color and form like a visual score: tight clusters of mark-making giving way to soft dissolves, details emerging from ambiguity lit by glowing street lights or nightclub strobes. The immediacy of her method is key. Painting wet into wet, she allows spontaneity to drive structure, letting sensation dictate likeness.

The paintings move between clarity and blur, creating an atmosphere where emotion is embedded as much in the texture of the paint as in the sitter’s gaze. Faces and figures are illuminated in synthetic hues of electric blues, acid pinks, and sodium yellows, yet is grounded in human tenderness.

Educated at Michigan State University and Metàfora Studio Arts in Barcelona, and currently a resident artist with RARO Barcelona, she is deeply influenced by the nightlife and street culture of her adopted city. Through her dynamic surfaces and glowing palettes, she offers a meditation on contemporary identity—where even the most artificial light can reveal something deeply human.

In addition to developing her painting practice at RARO, she continues to expand her career through exhibitions and collaborations with other artists and creative spaces in the city. Her work has been shown in galleries, cultural hubs, and artist-run spaces including PAAM Project, Àngels Espai 2, Espai Cènit, Nimura Room at Raima, Perros Mediterráneos, and Cascadas Art Space. She is also a founding member of the collective TBD Art, through which she has co-organized exhibitions in apartments and studio spaces throughout Barcelona.

Razzmatazz!, 2024

Oil on canvas
180 x 100 cm
1800€

The Singer Series 1, 2025

Oil on canvas
26 x 22 cm each
180€ each

Vermillion Gaze, 2025

Oil on canvas
55 x 46 cm
750€

Syzygy, 2025

Oil on canvas
55 x 46 cm
750€

Wall Flower, 2025

Oil on canvas
41 x 33 cm
280€

In a World of Red and Green, 2025

Oil on canvas
26 x 22 cm
180€

The Green Watcher, 2024

Oil on canvas
26 x 22 cm
180€