Zigzag road through barren landscape
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Gallery: a zigzag journey

August 4, 2024 / 69 Comments

The voyage of the best ship is a zigzag line of a hundred tacks. See the line from a sufficient distance, and it straightens itself to the average tendency.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

When I searched for interesting quotes about zigzag lines I was surprised to find relatively few. But of those I found, many talked about journeys, which as a keen traveller appealed to me:

Life is a zigzag journey, they say, not much straight and easy on the way, but the wrinkles in the map, explorers know, smooth out like magic at the end of where we go.

Ivan Doig, Last Bus to Wisdom

After all, aren’t zigzag journeys often the most interesting and rewarding? Sure, we could get there more quickly by following a straight line, but we’d see a lot less along the way. And as Emerson’s quote suggests, we still arrive at the same point eventually.

Photographic zigzags

Turning to photography, we often talk about and look at the use of leading lines, which direct us to a key point in an image. Zigzag lines don’t do that; instead they lead our eyes all over the image. They encourage us to explore what we’re seeing in more detail, just as a zigzag journey may do.

Patti has asked us to share some images of zigzags for this week’s Lens Artists challenge, so as usual I’ve been pouring through my archives. Perhaps unsurprisingly, many of the shots I found feature man-made zigzags, often architectural. But I did manage to hunt out some natural zigzags too. I fear you may have seen some of them previously but not all, I hope, and not in this context.

My feature photo is of the very zigzag road through Wadi Bani Awf in Oman.

Silhouette of an arched bridge with girders

Girders of the Tyne Bridge, Newcastle upon Tyne, England

Fire escape with man sitting on the steps
In the Meatpackers District
Concrete building with fire escape
In Soho

Fire escapes in Manhattan, NYC

Brick building with fire escape
In the River North district
Looking up at a tall skyscraper with metal framework
875 North Michigan Avenue (formerly the John Hancock Center)

Two rather different zigzags on buildings in Chicago

Close-up of a modern glass building reflecting an older one

Seattle Public Library, Washington State

Close up of part of a skyscraper with balconies

An apartment block in Tirana, Albania

Side of a modern building with metal girders and stairs

Detail of the Pompidou Centre in Paris

Tall rock outcrop with zigzag staircase
Zigzag staircase with people waving

The long zigzag stairs ascending El Peñol, Colombia

(my husband Chris and our guide Jean are waving to me from part way up, while I stayed at the bottom!)

Zigzag formations along a roof edge

The crenellated roof of the Palais Royale, Marrakech

Temple with tiered roofs
In Durbar Square, Kathmandu
Temple with tiered roofs
The Nyatapol Temple in Taumadhi Square, Bhaktapur

Temple roofs in Nepal

Low zigzag fence by a path on the coast

A zigzag fence by the path to Cattle Point Lighthouse, San Juan Island, Washington State

Jagged edge of a glacier

Glacier Grey, Torres del Paine National Park, Chile

Jagged rock formations
Jagged rock formations

Tsingy rock formations in Ankarana Est, Madagascar

Reptile with spiny back on a log

The spiny back of an Oustalet’s chameleon in Madagascar

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