retroaction

The eight Biennial artists in “RETROaction” — out of the 82 that participated back in the day — may have started on the margins but they ended up being represented by top-tier galleries.

“RETROaction” is similarly ambitious, though much smaller.

Thirty years later, at a moment where we seem to be dealing with so many of the same issues — pandemic, realignment of geopolitical boundaries, war, police brutality, economic crisis — “RETROaction,” at Hauser & Wirth, revisits these two art world events.

The purpose of “RETROaction,” according to Fowle and Bhabha, is not to relive 1993 at a 30-year remove.

What is to become of the prison population in a state known to dole out excessive sentencing for some crimes that have since been deemed misdemeanors, yet no retroaction was afforded?