Olympic gold medalist and heavyweight champion Muhammad
Ali (1942–2016) was a controversial antiwar activist, an embodiment of Black
pride and power, and an electrifying self-promoter. Refusing induction in the
military on religious grounds, Ali was arrested for draft evasion in 1967,
stripped of his boxing titles, and barred from professional matches. A year after
this portrait was made, the Supreme Court overturned his conviction, and the
man nicknamed “The Greatest” resumed his celebrated boxing career.

Ali was just one of the glamorous, powerful, accomplished,
and admired men and women photographed by Yousuf Karsh, whose elegantly composed
and exquisitely printed portraits constitute a veritable Who’s
Who of the second half of the 20th century.