Sailfish Wind in the Sails

Corpus Christi, Texas, United States

Animals and creatures

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Listed, not yet checked · Oct 2026

This Big Thing is recorded as still being here.

Wind in the Sails is a bronze sculpture of two leaping sailfish by Swedish-born sculptor Kent Ullberg on the Corpus Christi bayfront in Texas. His commissions list records a 23.5-foot bronze on red granite installed in January 1983 for the Caller-Times.

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Sailfish Wind in the Sails

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Approximate location · 27.773° N, 97.396° W

FIELD GUIDE

The story

Two bronze sailfish leap out of stylised waves on the Corpus Christi bayfront, and the title is a fisherman's blessing the sculptor brought from Sweden.

Visit Corpus Christi, the city's tourism body, wrote in July 2026 that the work shows "two sailfish soaring out of stylized waves" along the bayfront and called it one of the most photographed public art installations in the city. Kent Ullberg, the Swedish-born sculptor, lists it among his commissions as a 23.5-foot bronze on red granite, commissioned by the Corpus Christi Caller-Times and installed in January 1983. Waymarking.com, which copies the Smithsonian Art Inventory entry, lists a bronze sculpture with a red marble base, and its contributor describes it as 23 feet high including the base.

The same page also transcribes the inscription: the monument was given to the citizens of Corpus Christi by the Caller-Times Publishing Company to commemorate the paper's 100th anniversary. In an interview for the PBS series Made in Texas, Ullberg recalled that Ed Harte of the Caller-Times commissioned the piece and that fishing boats lay across from the site in those days. In Sweden, he said, you wish a fisherman wind in the sails, so he tried "to take two sailfish and create an abstract design. But realistic sailfish." He called it "my well wish to Corpus Christi", and agreed with his interviewer that it has no back.

Ullberg made other works under the same title, including a 17-foot stainless-steel sailfish in Stockholm installed in 2002, so the name does not always mean this one. A documentary about the sculptor, Ullberg: Wind in the Sails, was listed on PBS in 2026.

The sailfish stand on Shoreline Boulevard, and Visit Corpus Christi places Ullberg's Leaping Marlin at the entrance to North Padre Island and a bison outside the Art Museum of South Texas if you want to see more of his work.

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PRACTICAL

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WHAT TO EXPECT

An outdoor bronze monument on the Corpus Christi bayfront. In a 2026 PBS interview Ullberg agreed that it has no back. In July 2026 Visit Corpus Christi listed it with his other bayfront and island sculptures; the city publishes a Bayfront Art Brochure and Map for walking the area.

ACCESS

Shoreline Boulevard, Corpus Christi, Texas, along the Downtown Bayfront. It is a public outdoor monument.

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