Henderson photo exhibit shows Nevada then and now

LAS VEGAS (FOX5) — A new art exhibit at Henderson City Hall offers a look at Southern Nevada through some of the oldest photographs taken across the region, paired with images of what those same locations look like today.

The exhibit, titled “Stories of Southern Nevada,” draws from hundreds of historic photos — primarily taken between 1867 and 1871 by Civil War photographer Timothy O’Sullivan, who documented a then-rugged Nevada landscape of mines, ranches and the Colorado River.

Photographer spent years tracking down exact locations

Gary Reese, a photographer and geographer, spent years studying O’Sullivan’s images and working with his wife to determine the precise locations where the original photos were taken. The couple then returned to those spots to photograph them as they appear now.

“You got to do a lot of discovery in order to find the proverbial tripod holes where O’Sullivan was standing,” Reese said. “It sends you back in your mind in time to what that area looked like in 1871.”

Reese described the project as a “re-photography exhibit.” Some images show how dramatically the landscape has changed — including one photo near Hoover Dam where a figure that stood above water in 1871 would now be submerged by up to 30 feet during peak hydroelectric discharge.

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Exhibit layers historic and modern imagery

Meg Heeres, visual and public arts supervisor for the City of Henderson, said the display combines multiple technologies to tell the region’s story.

“This gives more like context… what was this place before Henderson? What was this place before Boulder City, before Las Vegas?” Heeres said.

Heeres described one piece in the exhibit that layers an original O’Sullivan photograph in black and white with a color image of Reese standing at the same location holding a print from a monograph, and a satellite image from a mapping program used to pinpoint the original shooting location.

“To me it’s like an amazing story of Nevada and how it’s changed and how it’s shifted and also how it hasn’t changed,” Heeres said.

Exhibit details

“Stories of Southern Nevada” is free and open to the public on the first floor of Henderson City Hall during normal business hours. The exhibit runs through Sept. 10.