Earlier this month, Agave Festival Marfa brought scholars and artists to Far West Texas to celebrate agave and the culture, art and history of the borderland. The festival featured panels on the state of agave spirits, talks by prominent authors and guided tours through the Chihuahuan desert.
To highlight the conversations from this year's festival, Marfa Public Radio is broadcasting selected talks on June 21 and 28 from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m.
You can find a complete archive of this year's readings, lectures and panel discussions below.
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Decolonizing the Fence at Cementerio del Barrio de los Lipanes
This panel discussion focuses on Presidio’s Cementerio del Barrio de los Lipanes, a sacred site to the Lipan Apache Tribe. Panelists focused their conversatoin on the history of the cemetery and the protection project currently underway there.
In this author talk, academic and historian Kelly Lytle Hernández discusses her book, “Bad Mexicans: Race, Empire, and Revolution in the Borderlands,” which tells the story of the magonistas, a group of migrant rebels who helped to incite the Mexican Revolution from inside the U.S.
During Agave Festival Marfa, renowned agricultural ecologist Gary Nabhan spoke about the culture of agave and biodiversity. Nabhan's latest book, which he co-authored with restauranteur David Suro Pinera, explores the past, present and future of mezcals.
Jeanette Favrot Peterson is an art historian whose interests include the intersection of European and Indigenous visual cultures.
During this year's festival, a panel of Mexican mezcal producers — Marco Ochoa of Gusto Historico, Sosima Olvera of Fanekantsini and Emilio Vieyra of Mezcal Don Mateo — discuss the state of agave spirit culture and its economic, cultural and environmental effects.
In his Agave Festival talk, acclaimed South Texas writer Fernando Flores reads from his book "Valleyesque." His other works include the novel "Tears of the Trufflepig" and the short-story collection "Death to the Bullshit Artists of South Texas."
The Consejo Certificador de Sotol is a regulatory body based in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. The group certifies the production of Sotol, protect the spirit's denomination of origin and promotes the spirit category worldwide.
Michelle García grew up in South Texas, and over the last two decades, her essays, documentaries, and reporting have often focused on the U.S.-Mexico border. She’s currently working on a book examining the region’s history and mythologies.
In this Agave Festival Marfa panel, Sarah Wilson talks about her new book,“Dig: Field Notes on Field and Family.” The work explores Wilson's connection with her grandfather through the photographs they both took in West Texas and Big Bend National Park — 50 years apart.
Myles is the celebrated author of “I Must Be Living Twice: New and Selected Poems”, “Chelsea Girls,” and “The Importance of Being Iceland.”
