Artist Lens | Hsu Chia-Wei: Listening to the Past

Hsu Chia-Wei’s multidisciplinary practice integrates art, archaeology, and technology, combining scientific methods with imaginative forms of storytelling. Since 2018, Hsu has been collaborating with archaeologists to investigate the histories of submerged sites off the coast of Taiwan. In a geography characterised by strong currents, reefs, and centuries of maritime activity—positioned at the nexus of trade routes between Northeast and Southeast Asia—Hsu uses archaeological technology as a tool for the speculative reimagining of history.

Hsu employs acoustic mapping techniques to examine sites such as shipwrecks, aiming to, in his words, ‘[let] these materials “speak” without a protagonist.’ Approaching archaeology through sound, he reflects: ‘can lead to many discoveries that were previously invisible . . . so many things are fundamentally different from how you first imagined them.’ Sound, as deployed by Hsu, acts less like a tool of measurement and more as a medium of encounter, something that is alive and constantly unfolding, positioning human experiences within a longer archaeological continuum.


English, Traditional Chinese, and Simplified Chinese closed captions are available in the player.


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