A year after his residency, the Canadian sculptor's monumental steel work Trinity headlined the three-artist exhibition at Gallery 12.26.
Simon Petepiece came to Corsicana for the spring 2025 residency at 100W to make large-scale sculpture that falls at the intersection of architecture and art, the ancient and futuristic. The result, Trinity, a freestanding 10- by 12-foot steel work that resembles a church steeple, and the wall-mounted sculpture Fan, anchored Herald (May 30–August 1, 2026), a three-artist show curated by Brittani Arnold, which placed Simon in communion with painter Jennifer Carvalho and ceramic and textile artist Em Kettner. Trained in architecture, Simon works with sacred geometry and the ways in which architecture can both inform and draw on devotional practice. Arnold designed the installation so visitors circulated Trinity, encountering its exposed steel framing that deliberately plays with scale. Arnold described the effect on viewers as almost devotional: “It had people in awe, that initial confrontation,” she says. “It feels almost akin to walking into a place of worship.”
“For me, the work will always be related to that time in Corsicana,” Simon says of the year-long wait between making the work and its unveiling. “It’s so generous there in terms of the space and the open landscapes.” That vastness, he adds, and the work it inspired, has pushed him toward more site-specific work, welcoming the envelope of a future space as part of how he now imagines a piece before it exists.
