From the exhibition
The Aga Khan
Leslie Ward · Leslie Ward ('Spy'), Vanity Fair, 10 November 1904
Signed 'Spy' in the lower left, this chromolithograph carries the caption 'The Aga Khan' beneath a full-length caricature of Sultan Mahomed Shah, Aga Khan III, imam of the Ismaili Muslims and prominent figure in British India. Ward dresses his subject in white tie and tails with a broad blue sash and jewelled star — the insignia of high imperial honour — acknowledging the Aga Khan's formal standing within the British establishment. The tension between mockery and flattery is characteristic of *Vanity Fair* at its most politically revealing.
Leslie Ward CC0
