Tishan Hsu

Tishan Hsu, (Left) It’s Not the Bullet but the Hole 2, 1991. (Front) Virtual Flow, 1990-2018. (Right) Fingerpainting, 1994. Installation view at “Liquid Circuit”, Hammer Museum; Los Angeles, 2020. Photo: Jeff McLane.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, Fingerpainting, 1994. Installation view at “Liquid Circuit”, Hammer Museum; Los Angeles, 2020. Photo: Jeff McLane.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, Virtual Flow, 1990-2018. Photo Kyle Knodell.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, (Left) Closed Circuit II, 1986. (Second to left) Vertical Ooze, 1987. Ooze, 1987. (Right) Reflexive Ooze, 1987. Installation view at “Liquid Circuit”, SculptureCenter; New York, 2021. Photo Kyle Knodell.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, Vertical Ooze, 1987. Photo: Jeff McLane.
Courtesy the Artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, Cellular-Automata, 1989. Private collection.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, Fingerprint, 1989.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, Interface Wall 3.0-Gwangju, 2021. Installation view at The 13th Gwangju Biennale.
Courtesy the artist; Gwangju Biennale 2021, Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, (Above) Outer Banks of Memory, 1984. (Below) Heading Through, 1984. Installation view at “Liquid Circuit”, Hammer Museum; Los Angeles, 2020. Photo: Jeff McLane.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, Outer Banks of Memory, 1984.
Photo: Jeff McLane.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, Cellular-Automata, 1989. Installation view at “Tishan Hsu”, Pat Hearn Gallery; New York, 1989. Private collection.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Installation view at “Glow Like That”, K11 Art Foundation, 2019.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, QMH 6.2.1, 2021.
Courtesy the Artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, Boating Scene GREEN 2, 2019.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Installation view at “Into Form: Selections from the Rose Collection, 1957 – 2018”, Rose Art Museum, 2019.
Courtesy the artist; Rose Art Museum, Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Installation view at “Tishan Hsu: Liquid Circuit”, Hammer Museum; Los Angeles, 2020. Photo: Jeff McLane.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, Manic Panic, 1987.
Courtesy the Artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Installation view at “Phantom Plane, Cyberpunk in the Year of the Future”, Tai Kwun Contemporary, 2019.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

Tishan Hsu, signal.noise/membrane, 2020.
Courtesy the artist; Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, Miguel Abreu Gallery; New York. © Tishan Hsu / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
Born in Boston, Massachusetts, Hsu’s early years were in Zurich, Switzerland, and Ohio, Wisconsin, Virginia and New York, U.S. Hsu had his first one-person show as a teenager in Roanoke, Virginia, where his paintings were exhibited in museums throughout the region. He received his B.S.A.D. in 1973 and M.Arch. in 1975 from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. While at MIT, he also studied film and photography at the Carpenter Center, Harvard University. Hsu has resided in New York since 1979. Hsu first showed in New York at the Pat Hearn Gallery. Since 1985, Hsu has shown extensively in the US, Europe, Mexico and Asia, with works in many public and private collections. From 1988-90, Hsu lived and worked in Cologne, Germany and from 2014-16 in Shanghai, China.
Much of the artist’s work has attempted to convey the changing cognitive and physical effects of an embodied technology. Hsu’s interest in technology has not been in the use of a particular apparatus but the perception of a technological affect. His work has included drawings, paintings, interactive digital media projections, and sculpture.
Selected public and private collections include Metropolitan Museum, New York; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Museum fur Moderne Kunst (MMK), Frankfurt am Main; High Museum, Atlanta; Terra Museum, Mexico City; Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Museum of Contemporary Art, North Miami; The Rubell Family Collection, Miami; Weisman Museum, Minneapolis; and The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. Hsu has served as a Member of the Board of White Columns and a Governor for the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. He was a Professor of Sculpture at Sarah Lawrence College and a visiting professor at Pratt Institute and Harvard University.
Tishan Hsu: Liquid Circuit, his first survey exhibition covering the period 1982 to 2002, was curated by Sohrab Mohebbi, and held at SculptureCenter, New York, following its first iteration at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, in 2020. His work was included in the 13th Gwangju Biennale, “Minds Rising, Spirits Tuning,” in 2021. Hsu is co-represented by Empty Gallery, Hong Kong, and Miguel Abreu Gallery, New York.