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The photojournalist Brian Harris, who passed away aged 73 from cancer, left school at 16 to work as a courier, and eventually became among the most esteemed British photojournalists of his generation.

An International Career

He journeyed the world as a freelance or a employee for Fleet Street publications, documenting major happenings including the collapse of the Berlin Wall, drought and hunger in Ethiopia and Sudan, the Troubles in Northern Ireland, war zones in the Balkans and across Africa, the aftermath of the Falklands war and four US presidential campaigns. Additionally, he produced poetic landscapes of the rural areas around his home county of Essex home.

According to his estimates he shot over 2m images, taking an average of 100 a day, but he made that count several years ago. He kept sharing historical and recent images daily on social media up to a short time before his death, and had been planning to give a talk on his life and work.

Notable Projects

Stories from a rollercoaster career included an costly premium flight in 1991 to attend the burial in India of the assassinated leader Rajiv Gandhi, where he fainted from sunstroke and pneumonia and was cooled down with ice that had been used to preserve the body.

His 1983’s images of the then Labour party leader Neil Kinnock with his wife, Glenys, falling into the tide on Brighton beach were published across multiple columns of a front page, and are often reprinted as a striking example of photo-opportunity hubris. His 2016’s memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, was named after an irritated John Major striking him with a folded briefing paper.

Professional Milestones

He was appointed as the Times’ most youthful staff photographer when he joined the paper in 1976, at the age of 26, and was based around the world for nearly a decade, including reporting of the end of the internal conflict in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). He later stepped down over what he considered editing of his most powerful images of famine in Africa.

In 1986 Harris was made head photographer as the team was assembled to create a new newspaper. He played a key role in forming the style of journalistic photography that the paper became known for, helping raise the bar for news photography and newspaper design, in dramatic images filling front and back pages. Among many awards, he was honoured as the What the Papers Say photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in eastern Europe recording the collapse of communism.

He worked as a freelance after being made redundant in 1999, and significant projects thereafter included a year spent capturing cemeteries across the world in 2006 for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, which resulted in an exhibition launched in London – where he gave a personal tour to Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh – and a moving book, Remembered.

Early Life and Beginnings

Harris was raised in eastern London, to Dorothy and Leonard Harris, an technician who later assisted him build a darkroom in the garage. In the mid 1950s, the family moved eastwards – and to a better area – to the Rise Park estate in Romford, Essex. Brian went to Chase Cross secondary modern school, learning practical skills in carpentry and metal crafting, before departing at 16.

At a central London agency, he rose rapidly from delivery boy to photographer, and began his working life at eastern London local papers before progressing to major publications.

Colleagues and Impact

Other photographers, often outpaced by him, remembered his work as astonishing. Nick Turpin, who collaborated with him in the early days, called him “a great and brave photographer”, an influence to a generation of junior colleagues. Tim Dawson, a union representative, said he “transformed the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ last golden age”.

Personal Life

In 2001 Harris reconnected through a website with Nikki, whom he had first met as a three-year-old in infant school, and they became close companions through his remaining years. After receiving his terminal diagnosis, they embarked on a driving tour in Europe, posting sunny images of fine dining and quality drinks, and revisiting significant sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His last task, finished a short time before his death, was to donate his vast archive of 55 years’ work to a permanent home. Among his preferred archive images he commented on a youthful Harris consuming large glasses of wine with the actor Helen Mirren: “What a blessed life I’ve had – no remorse and no ‘Must Do’s’”.

He was wed twice, both marriages concluded with divorce.

He is remembered by Nikki, his son Jacob, from his later union, Nikki’s daughter, Holly, and by his sister, Jan.