My Landscapes of Understanding project – the bridge landscape element

The bridge in language and as metaphor

Drawings and text by Frits Ahlefeldt

Bridges – common way to get across gaps, both in the landscapes and “bridging” people, understandings, differences, opinions and cultures… Bridges are used a lot both in language and in landscape planning, both it is not always that bridges make sense

Bridges and walls

Sometimes the bridges are bridging walls, setting up limits and borders are often used in connection with openings, where there are no natural borders or gaps, ( rivers, oceans, or other divide )  Here the bridge-wall zig-zag logic of many systems can get quite strange.

Bridges to nowhere

Some bridges are going nowhere, old bridges over railroads, no longer there, dried out lakes and bridges that never made it across, left as monuments of great ambition, but not the same level of commitment and fulfilling those ambitions.  Sometimes it is better to build a boat…

Bridge builders

Many facilitators, conflict experts and counselors describe themselves as “bridge builders” using the bridge metaphor to explain how they close the gap and create better understanding – by using the bridge metaphor

Love builders

Love as bridge and builders – special version of the bridge builder illustrationA special bridge situation is the “love builders, where the bridge is shaped as a heart. Where the bridge is not only about practical, sustainable solutions, but also about passion, feelings, relationships etc.

Relationship bridges

Some bridges, especially today, where more and more is about digital solutions, likes and networks, are the relationship bridges. This kind of bridge is both very classic, leading back to when all we could build with were our tribeal networks and relationships, jumping into the near future, where more and more solutions are handled, not by experts, but by networks.