Val Smets’ paintings navigate the intersections of memory, mythology, and the unconscious, depicting hybrid figures—humanized plants, nymphs, and metamorphic beings—caught in cycles of transformation. Through layered textures and nuanced color palettes, she explores duality, fluidity, and the porous boundary between reality and imagination.

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Smets holds a BF from La Cambre (ENSAV), Brussels, and an MFA in Painting from the Academy of Fine Arts of Uniarts Helsinki. Her work has been exhibited in solo exhibitions at Rabouan Moussion (Paris), Esther Verhaeghe Art Concept (Brussels), Galerie Zimmermann Kratochwill (Graz), and Valerius Gallery (Luxembourg). In 2022, she presented Bittersweet Invaders, a year-long installation at Kunsthaus Graz. She has also participated in group exhibitions at Better Go South (Stuttgart), Fir Gallery (Beijing), Das Weisse Haus (Vienna), and Gallerie Dumonteil (Paris).

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Smets has been an artist-in-residence at Das Weisse Haus (Vienna), the Styria Artist in Residence (Graz), and the Utö Residency in the Åland Islands. In 2022, she was nominated for the Edward Steichen Award Resident in New York. Her work was published by Fundação De Serralves on the occasion of the Major Exhibition in Park (2022) and has been commissioned for the Red House, Prime Minister’s Order in the Bofill-designed diplomatic residence, Tirana (2025).

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Her paintings are part of public collections such as the Luxembourg Ministry of Culture, Helmut Marko collection, and private collections in Belgium, Austria, France, Germany, Luxembourg, and Finland.

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