The Hill Climber - Misplaced Pages

Artwork by Jeff Decker

The Hillclimber

Artist	Jeff Decker
Year	June 2008
Dimensions	4.9 m (16 ft)
Location	Harley-Davidson Museum, Milwaukee
Coordinates	43°01′52.66″N 87°54′56.56″W / 43.0312944°N 87.9157111°W / 43.0312944; -87.9157111
Owner	Harley-Davidson Museum

The Hillclimber is a public artwork by American artist Jeff Decker located on the grounds of the Harley-Davidson Museum, which is in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States.

Description

The Hillclimber is a 5,000 pound bronze welded sculpture that stands 16 feet tall and was created by Jeff Decker. Decker is a Utah-based artist, historian and Harley enthusiast. This sculpture is an enlarged life and 1/2 size of his original called, By the Horns; a sculpture referencing the similarities of bull riding and the sport hill climbing. This was a somewhat collaborative piece done with painter David Uhl, another artist licensed by Harley-Davidson. The rider is shown participating in a sport called hillclimbing, popular in the 1920s and 30s. The figure is free of fear in his eyes as one foot is being swept off the bike and his right arm extends backwards."He is crashing," Decker said of the helmet less young rider. "But every hillclimber crashes. It's part of the race." Hillclimbers were known to race up hills nicknamed the “widow maker” because of the danger and high rate of injury involved in this sport. The sculpture portrays a vintage Harley rider frozen in a skyward wheelie on a DAH bike, one of only six in the world. A documentation to the artist's friendship with Willie and Nancy Davidson can be seen on the gear drive that is inscribed with "Willie G."

Historical information

This sculpture can be found on the Founders Terrace of the Harley-Davidson Museum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The sculpture is located on the most visible part of the museum's site. The piece was a gift from the family of Willie G. Davidson, a senior vice president and chief styling officer at Harley who is the grandson of one of the company founders, William A. Davidson. Willie and Nancy Davidson saw the original By the Horns sculpture and commissioned an enlarged duplicate to donate to the Harley-Davidson Museum.

References

v t e Public art in Milwaukee
Downtown	The Victorious Charge Family The Calling Wisconsin Workers Memorial Wind Leaves Birds of Knowledge of Good and Evil The Great Double Woodland Indian and Whistling Swans Solomon Juneau Leif, the Discoverer Letter Carriers' Monument Argo Bronze Fonz Walkways Through the Wall Abraham Lincoln George Washington Referee Immigrant Mother King Gambrinus RiverSculpture! Gertie the Duck General Douglas MacArthur The Spirit of Polonia World War I Memorial Flagpole Pedestrian Drama Midsummer Carnival Shaft Acqua Grylli Laureate Diana Trigon Pere Jacques Marquette Spanish–American War Soldier Ruins X Ex Stasis City Yard Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Peter John A Beam of Sun to Shake the Sky Rainbow Machine Topiary Lucere Dancing Through Life Mother Teresa Monument Jacques Marquette You Rise Above the World The Last Alarm John Plankinton
North Side	Celebrating the Arts Christian Wahl Elk On Watch Pattern Lapham Memorial Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Music Fishing Spirit of the Firefighter Dauntless Guardian Buildings 1992 Gear 23 All in the Air at Once First Flight Sea of the Ear Kindred Ties
East Side	Cleopatra's Wedge Float Polyphony Boy with Goose Eight Stone Lions Three Bronze Discs Holocaust Memorial Happy-Go-Luckies of Nature and Technology Blue Dress Park Sentinels Hermes Milwaukee Eclipse 'X' Intertwining Compass Erastus B. Wolcott Sharing the Load Robert Burns Near Here Compass Walk Like a River Spillover II Tip Jantar-Mantar Cass Street Park Brady Street Beasts Connect Fairies Candles
South Side	Menomonee Count Casimir Pulaski Spirit of Commerce Bay View Series A Place to Sit Stratiformis The Hill Climber Deflected Jets Angel in a Cage R. D. Whitehead Monument Memorial for Belle Austin Jacobs T. A. Chapman Memorial Nature Belle Oops, Missed Space Game Engine Company No. 10 William A. Starke Memorial Steel Reborn Red Flower Rising Equestrian statue of Tadeusz Kościuszko Patrick Cudahy Memorial SOARING Two Opposites Reaching Up Toward the Peak of Progress Edge Elements Ribbons VI Bridge Stone Bracelet Untitled Quartet Tending the Fire Bird and Fish The Sower The Reaper Giving Gifts Watertower
West Side	Henry Bergh Goethe–Schiller Monument Chrysalis The Ideal Scout Uptown Triangles Tree of Life Magic Grove Steuben Monument Kneeling Camels Teamwork Aaron Monument Yount Monument Selig Monument Uecker Monument Fire and Water Vliet Street Commons Miller Valley Veterans Monument Children of the West End
Lynden Sculpture Garden	Sinai Wandering Rocks Sea Form (Atlantic) Sky Fence Floating Sculpture No. 3 Mo, Ni, Que Trio Two-Piece Reclining Figure No. 9 Way Four Compound Junior Salem No. 7 Bremen Town Musicians Ancestor Queen of Sheba Rhythm in Space Peristyle, Three Lines Orizzontale Embrace Ursa Major Three Graces Large Torso, Arch Double Up Upstart The Lovers (di Suvero) Poland Axeltree Orbits Ritual II Hara Olympus The Lovers (Daen) Tensione No. 2 The Source Rainbow Unfolding Vegetative Sculpture I Round About Lodgepole Twist for Max Bench-Stone Windfall Knife Tree Conversations with Magic Stones, Figure Three Conversations with Magic Stones (Magic Stone Three) Kumo Untitled Arch Epicenter Epicenter II III Columns Flight Pin Oak I
Mobile projects	Overpass Light Brigade

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