Michael Agresta – words & ideas

I write about art, ideas, culture, and

Portfolio

Thinking Outside the Ballot Box

Cult or Cure? (MDMA and PTSD)

Wall Flowers

The Redemption of Sinead O’Connor

Has a San Antonio Inventor Solved a Problem of Small-scale Wind Power?

Bonnie and Clyde at 50

Brutally Suppressed in Her Lifetime, Gertrude Beasley Is Finally on Our Bookshelves

Illustrating Border Life for the Next Generation

How the Western Was Lost, and Why It Matters

Did Texas Blackouts Reveal Austin’s New Real-Estate Hot Spots?

Sedrick Huckaby Looks His Subjects in the Eye, from Dreamers to an Ex-President

Unveiling “Austin”

Lives in Limbo

Robert Irwin in Marfa

Robert Pruitt: Wards Matter

The Clothes that Make the Man

The Fantastic World of Cande Aguilar

The ‘Moby Dick’ of Texas Football Novels Is Hard-hitting as Ever

Mark Rothko, Houston’s Absent Son

Film Reviews and Local Arts Coverage

Austin Chronicle

Luz Maria Sanchez: Narco Violence, as Seen by a Journalist-Turned-Artist

The Psychedelic State of South Texas (Fernando A. Flores)

What Will Become of the Paper Book?

Forgetting How to Read? Stop Reading Online.

The Steve Jobs of West Texas

Houston Photo Exhibit Documents First Markers of Modern U.S.-Mexico Border

Houston’s National Women’s Conference, 40 Years Later

100 Ways to Draw a Line (Transborder Biennial)

No Gogh!

No Sign of Trump’s “Millions” of Illegal Voters in Texas

Dario Robleto artist profile

Life During Wartime (book review)

LA Review of Books

Cody Wilson, Austin’s Edgelord Prince

The Image in the 21st Century

While We Were Sleeping: The Feds Say a Price-fixing Scheme Costs Texas Patients Tens of Millions

Vincent Valdez: The Big Picture

A Tree Grows in San Antonio (Margarita Cabrera)

A Bigger Canvas (Houston Feature)

Travel & Leisure

What Is the Greatest Artwork in Texas?

Trenton Doyle Hancock: His Pet Monsters

The Wonderful World of Bluth

The People’s Champion (Vincent Valdez’s ‘Dream Baby Dream’)

Can Hackers Mess With Texas’s Elections?

No, Austin Won’t Become Silicon Valley 2.0

Welcome to Texas, Elon

“Trapped” in the Limelight

The Catastrophe Guru

Marfa, Texas Is Getting Its Own Solar-Powered Stonehenge

The Great Mellowing

At Age 86, Painter Roger Winter Is Still Reinventing Himself

Adios Utopia, Hello Texas

Giant Steps

EAST Austin Is Over. What’s Next for an Art Scene That’s Losing Its Nucleus?

The Great Texas Novel about the Spanish Flu

How Texas Women Delivered the Nineteenth Amendment

The Last Book Sale

What Will Become of the Library?

Will the Next Election Be Hacked?

What We Talk About When We Talk About Cults

Pacific Standard