The Greatest

The Greatest brings together nearly 100 photographs of Muhammad Ali at the height of his careerby Chris Smith. The images are accompanied by Smith’s memories of his time spent with Ali fromthe early days of his career until his final years before retirement.

Smith went spent time with Ali on several occasions, building an archive of photographs ofthe boxer both training and away from the gym. The book draws upon a selection of his imagesaccompanied by anecdotes giving insight to Ali’s early morning training sessions, the nowlegendary 5th Street Gym in Miami, those who worked with Ali, the press conferences, interactionswith the public and his conversations with the boxer himself. Smith was present when Ali wastraining for the ‘Fight of the Century’ in 1971 against Joe Frazier and when Ali first surrendered afight in 1980 to the young Larry Holmes. After retiring, most of Smith’s work was archived until he was approached by gallerist Alon Zakaimabout exhibiting his work in a retrospective. Together they went through his vast archive andbrought to light a selection of photographs, exhibited in 2012, and form the basis of this book. Theessay by Paolo Hewitt contextualises the political and social background to Ali’s life and career.