MIT List Center at 40: Oral Histories – Tishan Hsu

26 June 2026

In this video, Tishan Hsu talks about his exhibition “Tishan Hsu: Paintings” at the List Center in 1988. This archival footage is part of MIT's series celebrating 40 years at the List Center. A collection of interviews with artists, past directors, and current staff, tracing the oral history of an experimental place for contemporary art.

Tishan Hsu’s evocative sculptured paintings combine industrial scale, glowing color, high-tech material, and aerodynamic edges with forms, suggesting a dialogue between the technological and the organic. Since the mid-1980s, Tishan Hsu (b. 1951, Boston) has been at the forefront of exploring the effects of technological transformation, rendering poetic reimaginings of the human body through innovative materials and digital processes. His approach to the intersections of organic and artificial life has made him one of the most prescient voices in contemporary art today.

Watch in full via MIT here.

All footage used is from MIT List Visual Arts Center, MIT Museum, and MIT Library Archives.