Collection of Fifty-One Photographs Collected by Drew ‘Bundini’ Brown, Including Photographs of Muhammad Ali, Sugar Ray Robinson and Others.
V.P. 1960s-1970s. Fifty-one photographs, most measuring 3.5 x 5 inches, in hard plastic sleeves, as found. From the estate of Drew Bundini Brown. Generally fine condition with some normal fading to images, with subject identification stickers on sleeves. Item #List908
Drew ‘Bundini’ Brown worked as Muhammad Ali’s cornerman from 1963 onward, after working previously for Sugar Ray Robinson. He also wrote some of Ali’s speeches, including the famous “float like a butterfly, sting like a bee” poem that Ali famously used to taunt Sonny Liston. He got his start in boxing while working two doors down from Sugar Ray Robinson’s bar “Sugar Ray’s,” where he befriended the fighter and gained his trust. “I saw Muhammad reciting poetry on television in Greenwich Village—that was no way to train for a fight,” Robinson said. “The next day I told Muhammad he needed somebody to watch over him, somebody to keep him happy and relaxed. I had just the guy for him. His name was Drew Brown, but he called himself ‘Bundini.’”
Brown remained with Ali for the duration of his career, save for a brief period of exile when his marriage to a white woman caused dissent among some in Ali’s camp. His presence and verbal swagger contributed in no small part to Ali’s persona. Ali was of course a giant in the Civil Rights movement, but he has been credited by many as being at the root of what would become Hip-Hop. In an interview on the subject, Chuck D of Public Enemy states: “ “Muhammad Ali not only influenced hip-hop of course from the rhyming aspect, which is a known fact, but the brash swagger of backing it up… His boldness is hip-hop. It’s like he was saying, ‘First and foremost, I’m gonna overshadow everything in my path so that you won’t forget me ever. And I’m gonna throw some rhyme on top of it.’ It’s total hip-hop.”
Collected here are forty nine photographs from Brown’s estate, showing Brown, Ali and others in a range of settings, including at Ali’s camp in Pennsylvania and various fights and travels. Several photographs show Ali fighting, presumably taken by Brown himself from the corner. Other figures include Joe Louis, Sugar Ray Robinson, Joe Frazier, Floyd Patterson, Butch Lewis, Larry Holmes, Don King, Angelo Dundee, Jim Brown, Dick Gregory, Lionel Richie and Marlon Brando. Overall a very compelling and intimate group of images, with many taken from the entourage vantagepoint, often at very close range: Floyd Patterson appears between two heads in a crowd, an off-center portrait captures Brown with his arm around Marvin Gaye in a hotel room, a polaroid shows Joe Frazier sits slumped in a chair. We find no other record of these photographs, and as many of them are polaroids, it is likely that no copies exist. Overall an intimate look at the inner circle of Muhammad Ali.
Works cited:
- Chuck D as told to Michael Tillery. Muhammad Ali the Original Rapper. Theundefeated.com, accessed 3/17/21.
-Anderson, Dave. Sports of the Time: Float Like a Bundini. New York Times, Sept. 29, 1987, accessed 3/17/21.
Price: $3,750.00