Michael Agresta – words & ideas

I write about art, ideas, culture, and

Portfolio

The Steve Jobs of West Texas

Cody Wilson, Austin’s Edgelord Prince

Trenton Doyle Hancock: His Pet Monsters

The Last Book Sale

Life During Wartime (book review)

LA Review of Books

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

Marfa, Texas Is Getting Its Own Solar-Powered Stonehenge

How the Western Was Lost, and Why It Matters

The Image in the 21st Century

Lives in Limbo

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

Dario Robleto artist profile

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

Vincent Valdez: The Big Picture

Robert Pruitt: Wards Matter

What Is the Greatest Artwork in Texas?

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

Mark Rothko, Houston’s Absent Son

How Texas Women Delivered the Nineteenth Amendment

100 Ways to Draw a Line (Transborder Biennial)

Forgetting How to Read? Stop Reading Online.

A Bigger Canvas (Houston Feature)

Travel & Leisure

Giant Steps

What Will Become of the Paper Book?

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

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

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

Will the Next Election Be Hacked?

The Clothes that Make the Man

Illustrating Border Life for the Next Generation

The Great Mellowing

The Fantastic World of Cande Aguilar

Can Hackers Mess With Texas’s Elections?

A Tree Grows in San Antonio (Margarita Cabrera)

The Great Texas Novel about the Spanish Flu

What Will Become of the Library?

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

Wall Flowers

No Gogh!

Adios Utopia, Hello Texas

Bonnie and Clyde at 50

Unveiling “Austin”

Robert Irwin in Marfa

The Redemption of Sinead O’Connor

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

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

What We Talk About When We Talk About Cults

Pacific Standard

The Catastrophe Guru

No, Austin Won’t Become Silicon Valley 2.0

At Age 86, Painter Roger Winter Is Still Reinventing Himself

Cult or Cure? (MDMA and PTSD)

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

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

Welcome to Texas, Elon

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

The Wonderful World of Bluth

Thinking Outside the Ballot Box

“Trapped” in the Limelight