W. EUGENE SMITH: I HAVE TRIED TO LET TRUTH BE MY PREJUDICE
Opening: A legend among 20th-century photo journalists, Smith was a cantankerous idealist who documented the so-called American Century in all its gritty pathos. During World War II he followed GIs to Iwo Jima and MacArthur to the Philippines. Working for Life magazine back home, he photographed a country doctor and a midwife on their rounds, Pittsburgh steelworkers, artists, musicians, a Ku Klux Klan rally and more. Traveling the world, he found Albert Schweitzer in Africa, impoverished villagers in Spain and, most famously, a Japanese fishing village whose residents were hideously maimed and dying of mercury poisoning from industrial pollution. The image shown here is from the 1948 "Country Doctor" series. His compelling legacy is celebrated in a retrospective of more than 40 lifetime prints rarely seen in the Midwest. (Opening reception 6-8:30 p.m. Fri., free. Weinstein Gallery, 908 W. 46th St., Mpls. 612-822-1722 or www.weinstein-gallery.com) Mary Abbe
