Thrill-Seeking Photographer Describes What It’s Like to Be Inside an Active Volcano

Photographer Ulla Lohmann is a thrill-seeker. As a National Geographic Creative and Canon Explorer, she finds and photographs incredible scenes that most of us only dream of seeing in person. Some of these experiences are extreme—in both their location and the conditions she endures. Throughout the last decade, Lohmann has trekked around the world to explore active volcanoes from the inside.

Lohmann has ventured to locales like Congo, Chile, and Vanuatu to be part of the action. Her images are electrified with fiery yellow-orange lava and punctuated by the dark silhouettes of the surrounding landscape. We can practically feel the heat coming from these amazing masses of earth.

Although Lohmann’s incredible photos of active volcanoes illustrate their intensity, the photographer gives us a better sense of just what it’s like to be at—and inside—them. In an interview with the BBC, she explains, “I went 600m deep inside an active volcano, and it’s like going right to the heart of the earth. I am kind of trapped in that tunnel, I mean, I feel very, very small, [and] I just look at the sky and it’s very, very high above.” On one side of her is a lava lake that’s boiling and bubbling at around 1,200 degrees. “It’s really alive,” she says.

“I feel very humble, like, this nature is so big, and it’s just a mind-blowing feeling,” Lohmann explains. “The earth is shaking and trembling, and sometimes it’s even hard to stand.” In terms of sounds, she says a volcano makes a “roaring thunder” that’s akin to a pot of boiling water “but a hundred times louder.”

Lohmann sells her work through her online store.

For the last 10 years, photographer Ulla Lohmann has snapped photos of active volcanos, even venturing inside them.

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Of the active volcano photos, Lohmann describes what it's like to experience them.

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“I went 600m deep inside an active volcano, and it’s like going right to the heart of the earth,” she says. “I am kind of trapped in that tunnel, I mean, I feel very, very small.”

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“The earth is shaking and trembling, and sometimes it’s even hard to stand.”

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Ulla Lohmann: Website | Instagram | Facebook
h/t: [Design You Trust]

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Sara Barnes

Sara Barnes is a Staff Editor at My Modern Met, Manager of My Modern Met Store, and co-host of the My Modern Met Top Artist Podcast. As an illustrator and writer living in Seattle, she chronicles illustration, embroidery, and beyond through her blog Brown Paper Bag and Instagram @brwnpaperbag. She wrote a book about embroidery artist Sarah K. Benning titled 'Embroidered Life' that was published by Chronicle Books in 2019. Sara is a graduate of the Maryland Institute College of Art. She earned her BFA in Illustration in 2008 and MFA in Illustration Practice in 2013.
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