Michael Agresta – words & ideas

I write about art, ideas, culture, and

Portfolio

The Great Texas Novel about the Spanish Flu

A Tree Grows in San Antonio (Margarita Cabrera)

Bonnie and Clyde at 50

Illustrating Border Life for the Next Generation

The Fantastic World of Cande Aguilar

What Will Become of the Library?

Wall Flowers

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

No Gogh!

100 Ways to Draw a Line (Transborder Biennial)

Robert Irwin in Marfa

What Will Become of the Paper Book?

Giant Steps

The Last Book Sale

What We Talk About When We Talk About Cults

Pacific Standard

The Redemption of Sinead O’Connor

Forgetting How to Read? Stop Reading Online.

Trenton Doyle Hancock: His Pet Monsters

How Texas Women Delivered the Nineteenth Amendment

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

Unveiling “Austin”

“Trapped” in the Limelight

At Age 86, Painter Roger Winter Is Still Reinventing Himself

The Catastrophe Guru

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

Life During Wartime (book review)

LA Review of Books

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

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

Can Hackers Mess With Texas’s Elections?

The Image in the 21st Century

Cult or Cure? (MDMA and PTSD)

Dario Robleto artist profile

Mark Rothko, Houston’s Absent Son

Cody Wilson, Austin’s Edgelord Prince

The Great Mellowing

What Is the Greatest Artwork in Texas?

The Steve Jobs of West Texas

A Bigger Canvas (Houston Feature)

Travel & Leisure

No, Austin Won’t Become Silicon Valley 2.0

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

The Clothes that Make the Man

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

Marfa, Texas Is Getting Its Own Solar-Powered Stonehenge

Adios Utopia, Hello Texas

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

How the Western Was Lost, and Why It Matters

Vincent Valdez: The Big Picture

The Wonderful World of Bluth

Lives in Limbo

Thinking Outside the Ballot Box

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

Robert Pruitt: Wards Matter

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

Welcome to Texas, Elon

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

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

Will the Next Election Be Hacked?