Stefani Art Gallery is honored to present Before the Water Rose: Celilo Falls, 1956, a landmark presentation of photographs by master photographer Richard Stefani. 

Taken in the fall of 1956, just months before Celilo Falls was submerged by the waters behind The Dalles Dam, these remarkable images document one of the final seasons at Celilo Falls before its inundation, at a place that had been a center of Indigenous fishing, trade, gathering, and culture for thousands of years. 

At just twenty-three years old, Richard Stefani traveled to Celilo Falls with two cameras and only two rolls of color film. Unaware that history was about to change forever, he photographed the people, traditions, and landscape with remarkable honesty and sensitivity.

 Nearly seventy years later, these photographs offer an extraordinary window into a place that no longer exists, yet remains deeply significant to the history and culture of the Columbia River. 

This exhibition marks the first time this collection has been presented publicly in its entirety.