The work @basjanader_#I’mtstty explores the culture of copying and imitation on the internet, as well as the perception of emotions in the context of changing technologies and forms of mediated communication. Its starting point is an archive compiled by Sven Bergelt of video reenactments of Bas Jan Ader’s film I'm too sad to tell you. In 2007, Bergelt reenacted the film himself and published the video on YouTube under the title I’m sad enough to show you. In doing so, he revisited Ader’s engagement with the authenticity and mediation of sadness within the context of what was then the emerging Web 2.0.

In the years that followed, an increasing number of imitations, adaptations, and remixes of Ader’s film appeared on YouTube. Bergelt began collecting these videos, together with comments, metadata, and other audiovisual and textual material, and incorporating them into an archive of his own. Within the archive, the individual reenactments not only relate to the original film but also enter into relationships with one another, while the comment sections open up additional forms of contextualization.

For each exhibition, the archival material is revisited and translated into different spatial and media-based constellations, each establishing a different focus. The archive thus itself becomes a process-based artistic and curatorial form. With each new presentation, the work examines how images and emotions change through shifting media and technologies, how they are classified and interpreted, and what new forms of communication emerge as a result.

Gallery EIGEN + ART Leipzig, 2013
For its first presentation, the archive was displayed within the gallery’s movable grid structure. Visitors could shift different layers of the grid, thereby bringing different aspects and temporal layers of the archive into relation with one another.

CYNETART Festival Dresden, 2013
At the CYNETART Festival, the visual dimension of the archive took centre stage. At a desk equipped with 18 DVD players, visitors could select archived videos themselves and combine them into constantly changing constellations.

Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig, 2014
At the Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig, the work was presented as a sound installation. The focus was on voiced versions of user comments posted on YouTube in response to Bas Jan Ader’s original film. These comments negotiate stereotypical gender notions surrounding crying, question the purpose and meaning of art, and establish biographical connections to Bas Jan Ader.

HALLE 14 – Centre for Contemporary Art Leipzig, 2021
For the exhibition at HALLE 14, the archival material was combined with AI software for language- and facial-based emotion recognition. This expanded the work’s exploration of the mediated representation of emotions to include questions of their algorithmic classification.

Kunstraum Lakeside Klagenfurt, 2023
At Kunstraum Lakeside in Klagenfurt, the work was presented as an installation and performance. A chatbot generated texts in response to the title I'm too sad to tell you, which were subsequently performed and translated into human interaction. The texts oscillate between expressions of empathy, reassurances that sadness is normal, and offers of support.