Q&A: Henk Van Rensbergen, photographer of abandoned places
Hospital, Brandenburg, Germany
One man’s obsession for rediscovering the places society leaves behind gives us an indication of just how tenuous a grip humanity has on the planet it inhabits.
Exploration is one of the defining characteristics of the human being. To explore, to discover new places and new experiences – not because of necessity, but because we just want to – is one of the characteristics that separates us from other animals. There was no need for Captain Scott to lead his doomed expedition to the Antarctic or for astronauts Aldrin, Collins and Armstrong to venture to the Moon, but that is exactly what they did. For what? For the chance to see something that no-one had ever witnessed before, to push the boundary out again.
Airline pilot Henk van Rensbergen is motivated by this same urge to discover, though it is the world’s abandoned buildings that fascinate him, rather than new territories or planets. Since the 1990s, he’s spent his spare time finding his way into old factories, mental hospitals, prisons, houses and power stations, long since left to nature, graffiti artists, tramps and those who can make money from metal, tiles and wood – and all the other hardware that gets left behind.
Sometimes overgrown to the point of returning to the wild, at other times, looking like the last person has just left, these buildings have been captured for posterity with a series of beautiful photographs by Van Rensbergen – the best of which have been collated in his second book Abandoned Places 2. Here, he tells Umbrella what it is about the places humans used to live and labour in that so fascinates him.
Theatre, Newark, USA
Hi Henk. When did you start exploring abandoned places? What made you do it?
I’ve always explored since I was a kid, and frankly, don’t we all remember that feeling when we were children of exploring a cellar or attic? It’s that feeling of discovering something forgotten or forbidden, of rediscovering an abandoned place and reliving what must have happened there.
What sort of buildings fascinate you most? Have you got any particular favourites?
I have no absolute favourite type – they all speak to me, but some say more than others or tell different stories. I remember this factory that I ‘discovered’ years ago in a small town called Tertre, in Belgium. It was huge and untouched – everything was still there: the paperwork in the offices, the tools in the hangars, the clothes, boots, machines, calendars on the walls. This factory was the size of a small city. I spent a long time exploring every corner until I felt the building had revealed all its secrets to me, told me all its stories. That was a great discovery, as if I had met an interesting person.
Left: Dental surgery, Detroit, USA. Right: Racing track, Groenendaal, Belgium
“Risk is there constantly – every year, some urban explorers die”
How do you find about these places?
In the early days when I was still the only one doing this (at least that is what it felt like), I just drove around, looking for places. When my website came online in the early ’90s, I quickly established contact with other explorers (the phrase ‘urban explorer’ didn’t exist yet at that time) and people started mailing tips and places to me. Now, the community of urban explorers is so large that it isn’t all that hard to find places. The new places, however, are kept secret by those who find them. If you have something to trade, you get something in return.
How easy is it to get in to these places?
Some places are easy because they’re just forgotten about – there’s no security and no-one cares if you go there. When places are guarded you have to make a tough decision: urban exploring really isn’t about breaking the law and nosing about stuff that isn’t yours. When an owner wants to protect his property, then we don’t have any business there. Urban explorers should never force their way in, or harm anyone’s privacy. That being said, it can happen that you ‘meet’ security guards. I’m always polite, apologise for any inconvenience and usually get away with it.
Hotel lobby, Detroit, USA
You’ve said you never take things away as souvenirs. Why?
There’s two reasons: first, we’re not thieves, just visitors. We don’t take stuff that doesn’t belong to us. If you get caught with a backpack full of souvenirs then you can’t claim to be just photographing. Secondly, if everyone takes stuff, then these beautiful abandoned places full of history very quickly become empty rooms without a story. I once read this sentence in a book: “I have a large seashell collection which I keep scattered all over the beaches of the world... maybe you’ve seen it?”
Can you feel the presence of people who were there before?
I let my imagination work. I don’t believe in ghosts (at least, I’ve never seen or felt any), but with imagination you can go a long way – before I start exploring a new building, I sit down and listen to the silence, smell the odours, and look around, trying to imagine how this place used to be, who used to live or work here, who fell in love, who died…
“I sit down and listen to the silence, smell the odours, and look around, trying to imagine how this place used to be”
What’s the creepiest place you’ve visited? You’ve been to a near-untouched house where a woman murdered a child, haven’t you?
True, that was a creepy place, especially when I heard a baby cry and a woman talk softly to her – the voice was really close to me, I could almost hear the breathing. This house was only partly abandoned: in the other half lived a young family with a baby. The wall separating me (in the abandoned part) and the mother and child must have been really thin. It felt like intruding in their family life, I left without making a sound.
Anywhere else?
Walking by myself in an abandoned crypt was also quite creepy, maybe at that point I was closest to feeling something of a presence (if there are ghosts, then they must be there!) that was trying to stop me and… tell me something. But I didn’t get the message.
Have you come close to injuring yourself on your explorations?
No, not really. I love the adventure and adrenaline, but I avoid risk. This being said, the risk is there, constantly – most of these places are in very bad shape. Every year, urban explorers die in accidents.
Where are you going next?
I’m not telling you.
Abandoned Places 2 is out now.