West Texas Moments: This past weekend, the sixth-annual Agave Festival Marfa brought scholars and artists to Far West Texas to celebrate agave and the borderland's deep history. The festival’s events included panels on the state of agave spirits, talks from prominent authors and guided tours through the Chihuahuan desert.

The festival also included live music from local artists like Remijio “Primo” Carrasco, who performed at the El Cosmico campgrounds along with Grupo Ambición and the Marfa Municipal Alliance of Dead Country and Folk Singers.

Michelle García, whose work has focused on the U.S.-Mexico border over much of the last two decades, was one of the speaker's featured during the festival. García spoke about what she calls “border theater,” and the role it plays in the American imagination.

One of the event's panels focused on the recent efforts to protect Presidio's Cementerio del Barrio de los Lipanes, a sacred site to the Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas. Panelists included Indigenous voices of the Big Bend and architects with the firm designing a protective structure around the site.

During this year's Agave Festival, Kelly Lytle Hernández read from her book “Bad Mexicans: Race, Empire, and Revolution in the Borderlands.” The book tells the story of a group of migrant rebels who sparked the Mexican Revolution from inside the U.S.

On Sunday, festival attendees gathered in Presidio to visit the Cementerio del Barrio de los Lipanes. Architects with MASS Design Group and members of the local Indigenous community led a tour of an ongoing construction project that aims to protect the cemetery and preserve its history without making it feel inaccessible.

Christina Hernandez, whose ancestor is buried at the Cementerio del Barrio de los Lipanes, addresses the group gathered to learn about the site. Hernandez is an enrolled member of the Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas, and her family has taken care of the graves at the cemetery for decades. She and other local Indigenous community members like Xoxi Nayapiltzin, left, worked with architects including Mayrah Udvardi, right, to develop the protective design.

During the four-day festival, 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.