Michael Agresta – words & ideas

I write about art, ideas, culture, and

Portfolio

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

The Wonderful World of Bluth

Dario Robleto artist profile

Mark Rothko, Houston’s Absent Son

Bonnie and Clyde at 50

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

The Great Mellowing

How the Western Was Lost, and Why It Matters

Marfa, Texas Is Getting Its Own Solar-Powered Stonehenge

Vincent Valdez: The Big Picture

Unveiling “Austin”

Life During Wartime (book review)

LA Review of Books

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

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

The Image in the 21st Century

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

Robert Irwin in Marfa

“Trapped” in the Limelight

How Texas Women Delivered the Nineteenth Amendment

The Fantastic World of Cande Aguilar

Illustrating Border Life for the Next Generation

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

Cody Wilson, Austin’s Edgelord Prince

Wall Flowers

No Gogh!

What Is the Greatest Artwork in Texas?

Will the Next Election Be Hacked?

What We Talk About When We Talk About Cults

Pacific Standard

100 Ways to Draw a Line (Transborder Biennial)

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

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

Trenton Doyle Hancock: His Pet Monsters

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

Thinking Outside the Ballot Box

Forgetting How to Read? Stop Reading Online.

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

Giant Steps

The Catastrophe Guru

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

A Bigger Canvas (Houston Feature)

Travel & Leisure

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

The Clothes that Make the Man

Robert Pruitt: Wards Matter

No, Austin Won’t Become Silicon Valley 2.0

What Will Become of the Library?

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

At Age 86, Painter Roger Winter Is Still Reinventing Himself

A Tree Grows in San Antonio (Margarita Cabrera)

Lives in Limbo

Welcome to Texas, Elon

The Great Texas Novel about the Spanish Flu

The Steve Jobs of West Texas

What Will Become of the Paper Book?

The Redemption of Sinead O’Connor

Cult or Cure? (MDMA and PTSD)

Adios Utopia, Hello Texas

Can Hackers Mess With Texas’s Elections?

The Last Book Sale