Michael Agresta – words & ideas

I write about art, ideas, culture, and

Portfolio

A Tree Grows in San Antonio (Margarita Cabrera)

Wall Flowers

The Fantastic World of Cande Aguilar

Life During Wartime (book review)

LA Review of Books

How the Western Was Lost, and Why It Matters

The Wonderful World of Bluth

What Will Become of the Library?

Adios Utopia, Hello Texas

Cody Wilson, Austin’s Edgelord Prince

Can Hackers Mess With Texas’s Elections?

The Redemption of Sinead O’Connor

Illustrating Border Life for the Next Generation

Trenton Doyle Hancock: His Pet Monsters

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

“Trapped” in the Limelight

A Bigger Canvas (Houston Feature)

Travel & Leisure

Cult or Cure? (MDMA and PTSD)

Lives in Limbo

The Catastrophe Guru

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

Robert Irwin in Marfa

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

Giant Steps

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

How Texas Women Delivered the Nineteenth Amendment

Unveiling “Austin”

Forgetting How to Read? Stop Reading Online.

Mark Rothko, Houston’s Absent Son

The Image in the 21st Century

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

What Will Become of the Paper Book?

Bonnie and Clyde at 50

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

The Great Mellowing

Dario Robleto artist profile

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

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

Will the Next Election Be Hacked?

The Steve Jobs of West Texas

Robert Pruitt: Wards Matter

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

What We Talk About When We Talk About Cults

Pacific Standard

Thinking Outside the Ballot Box

Marfa, Texas Is Getting Its Own Solar-Powered Stonehenge

No Gogh!

The Clothes that Make the Man

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

The Great Texas Novel about the Spanish Flu

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

What Is the Greatest Artwork in Texas?

100 Ways to Draw a Line (Transborder Biennial)

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

Welcome to Texas, Elon

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

Vincent Valdez: The Big Picture

The Last Book Sale

At Age 86, Painter Roger Winter Is Still Reinventing Himself

No, Austin Won’t Become Silicon Valley 2.0