History Is Written by the Victorious

And Losers Have Nothing to Lose

[archival documentation]

The Extension competition was organized in 1997 by the Hamburg Kunsthalle as an international net art contest.

In January 1996, I created my first net art work, 0.HTML. The work was submitted to Extension ’97. It consisted of a collage of online materials such as political speeches, animated GIFs, philosophy quotations, academic texts, and fragments of history. Andreas Broeckmann later described it as “an archive of historical techno imagination, world politics and a grain of melancholy” (Leonardo Electronic Almanac, MIT Press, 2000).

↑ 0.HTML (created: January 1996, deleted: 15 June 2011)

My work received the third prize.

The Extension competition is primarily remembered for Cornelia Sollfrank‘s brilliant intervention Female Extension, in which she created 289 fictitious female artists and submitted automatically generated works. This was one of the most radical, influential, and significant cyberfeminist actions of the period.

The jury consisted of Uwe M. Schneede, Valie Export, Dieter Daniels, Dellbrügge & de Moll, and Rainer Wortmann. Four prizes were awarded: three to men, and one Sonderpreis (special prize) to Munich-based artist Christine Meierhofer.

I had nothing to do with the selection process, and no knowledge of the broader debate among net artists at the time. Specifically, Cornelia Sollfrank later explained (Rhizome interview with Michael Connor, 2017) that internal discussions among net artists had preceded the competition. Some artists chose not to participate, and others deliberately submitted weaker works as a form of protest. Key figures such as JODI and Alexei Shulgin did not contribute their strongest work, or abstained from participation altogether. This meant that several of the awarded works, including mine, were submitted by complete outsiders rather than by the central figures, the then elite of the net art scene.

The Extension ’97 event subsequently became emblematic in debates about gender, power, and institutional recognition within net art. The winners, particularly the three male artists, were framed in contrast to Sollfrank’s intervention. Christine Meierhofer’s role as the Sonderpreis awardee was often omitted in later accounts. Over the years, I also witnessed artists and curators mocking the winners of that competition in casual or formal conversation, without realizing I was one of them. In September 2010, for example, Hans Bernhard from Ubermorgen.com, during a presentation of his works in Ljubljana, also mentioned Cornelia Sollfrank and her groundbreaking action. At the same time, he referred to us—the “male winners”—as anti-feminists. Of course, he didn’t know that I was among his listeners.

Documentation varies in accuracy and is often incomplete. For example, Christine Meierhofer, who received the Sonderpreis, is often omitted from memories and articles:

↑ cropped image: https://anthology.rhizome.org/female-extension

In 2017, Michael Connor, Executive Director of Rhizome, commented on my Facebook post that this

“screenshot is taken at a resolution for a typical browser window for that time period – it is not an editorial decision intended to erase her part in the history.”

To provide full context, here is the complete announcement of winners—a full screenshot of the website—including Christine Meierhofer’s name (not published in Rhizome’s archives):

↑ Screenshot: Hamburger Kunsthalle – Extension (original website deleted in June 2011 by the Hamburg Kunsthalle)

If Christine Meierhofer is mentioned, like in the Rhizome anthology on Female Extension, her award is wrongly described as an “honorable mention”:

“The prize was awarded to three projects, all submitted by men, with an honorable mention going to Christine Meierhofer.”

In fact, her Sonderpreis was a Philips Multimedia Monitor (CRT monitor with TV card/tuner) valued at 2,500 DM. My third prize included 3,000 DM before taxes.

Cornelia Sollfrank, in her interview with Michael Connor (2017), described the dynamic of institutional prize-giving as a disciplinary or corrupting mechanism:

“That’s how you discipline artists or how you corrupt them. You put a few thousand dollars here and say, ‘Come on, jump,’ and then you get the money.”

Female Extension and Net Art Generator are among the most important net art works ever made. I have enthusiastically shown and discussed both works with art students around the world on multiple occasions. Although we never met in person (edited: until December 2025), I collaborated with her online a couple of times. We never spoke directly about Extension ’97. But in November 2019, Sollfrank commented on my Facebook post about it for the first and only time, replying to me directly with a remark:

“oh dear, what can I say… bad luck!? wrong place, wrong time? If you need to talk, I’m here 🤗”

↑ Facebook comment, 20 November 2019

In November 2019, Jenny Meier (artist, writer, activist, feminist, and at the time a PhD student with Greg Sholette in New York City) posted the following on Instagram @jennygoldenmeier:

Since once again it was “all of them male,” I kindly reached out to her and shared everything I knew on the subject. In an email from 21 November 2019, she wrote to me:

“Dear Igor, thank you so very much! I don’t feel you are on the bad side actually. To me it seems more that it’s Kunsthalle who did not get it…”

And on 22 November 2019, she added:

“I am glad you explained all that to me. Even though we don’t know each other I can totally relate to the feelings and thoughts you expressed. Thank you for your trust, openness and vulnerability! We are all humans and sometimes struggles are too black and white to fully cover reality! I know that very well. I am glad I can hear your voice.”

Additional reference: In 2017, Annet Dekker edited the book Lost and Living (in) Archives: Collectively Shaping New Memories (Valiz, Amsterdam, 2017). This book includes a longer conversation between Sakrowski, the Berlin-based net art curator, and myself, where, among other topics, we discuss the Extension ’97 case.

↑ Annet Dekker (Ed.): Lost and Living (in) Archives: Collectively Shaping New Memories, Valiz, Amsterdam, 2017

↑ Der Spiegel: Kunst aus dem Netz, 1 October 1997

History is always written by the victors. Not that it matters, but now you know.

Igor Štromajer
Frankfurt am Main, 22 September 2025

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↑ A footnote: I didn’t receive the first prize, despite Tilman Baumgärtel mistakenly claiming so in his book (Net Art 2.0: New Materials Towards Net Art, Verlag für moderne Kunst, Nürnberg 2005, p. 134).

Baumgärtel writes:

“Igor Štromajer’s first appearance on the international scene was a surprise breakthrough. When the Hamburg Kunsthalle staged its Net Art competition Extension in 1997, Štromajer came, saw, and conquered with his work 0.HTML. Even though he had hardly been known in the Net Art scene before, he immediately took First Prize and was probably more surprised about it than anyone else.”

In reality, it was the third prize. But, well, details.

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