Smooth Operator (2021)
Digital Video, Installation

Smooth Operator consists of a montage of archival footage
culled from television advertisements for wrinkle creams and
moisturizers. Visually cryptic when divorced from their
commercial contexts – inscrutable on their own terms – these
animations are intended to depict the promised action of a
given skincare product on the surface of the skin. By
presenting this imagery in aggregate and scoring it with
“Smooth Operator” by Sade, Lisa Bell Weisdorf performs a
simple détournment, denuding these purely spectacular
representations of any claims to scientificity. The pretense that
they provide any meaningful information can be abandoned,
and they may be experienced as the shamelessly seductive
conduits of visceral affect that they are.

View the full video with audio here: https://lisabellweisdorf.com/smooth-operator