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The photojournalist Brian Harris, who passed away at the age of 73 of cancer, ended his schooling at 16 to become a messenger boy, and eventually became among the most esteemed UK documentary photographers of his era.

An International Career

He journeyed across the globe as a freelance or a employee for major British titles, documenting such events as the collapse of the Berlin Wall, drought and hunger in Ethiopia and Sudan, the conflict in Northern Ireland, war zones in the Balkan region and across Africa, the consequences of the Falklands war and four US election campaigns. He also created poetic landscapes of the rural areas around his home county of Essex home.

According to his estimates he took over 2m images, averaging 100 a day, but he made that count some years back. He kept sharing archive and new images daily on social media up to a few weeks before his passing, 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 funeral in India of the slain politician Rajiv Gandhi, where he collapsed from heatstroke and pneumonia and was treated with ice that had been employed to cool the body.

His 1983’s images of the then Labour party leader Neil Kinnock with his wife, Glenys, toppling into the sea on Brighton beach were carried across eight columns of a front page, and are regularly reproduced as a striking example of photo-opportunity hubris. His 2016’s memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, was named after an exasperated John Major hitting him with a rolled-up briefing paper.

Career Highlights

He became the a major newspaper’s youngest ever staff photographer when he started there in 1976, at the age of 26, and worked around the world for almost ten years, including reporting of the end of the civil war in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). He eventually resigned over what he saw as editing of his most powerful images of starvation in Africa.

In 1986 Harris became chief photographer as the team was put together to launch a new newspaper. He was instrumental in shaping the style of journalistic photography that the paper became known for, helping raise the bar for news photography and broadsheet design, in striking images covering multiple pages. Among numerous awards, he was named the What the Papers Say photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in the former Eastern Bloc recording the fall of communism.

He operated independently after being made redundant in 1999, and significant projects after that included a year spent photographing cemeteries across the world in 2006 for the war memorial organisation, which led to an display launched in London – where he gave a private viewing to Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh – and a moving book, Remembered.

Early Life and Beginnings

Harris was born in east London, to Dorothy and Leonard Harris, an electrician who later assisted him construct a darkroom in the garage. In the 1950s, the family moved farther east – and up in the world – to the Rise Park housing estate in Romford, Essex. Brian attended Chase Cross secondary modern school, learning practical skills in woodwork and metal crafting, before leaving at 16.

At a central London agency, he quickly advanced from delivery boy to photographer, and launched his professional career at eastern London local papers before moving on to national publications.

Colleagues and Legacy

Fellow photographers, often outpaced by him, recalled his work as remarkable. Nick Turpin, who worked with him in the initial stages, called him “a great and fearless photographer”, an inspiration to a cohort of junior colleagues. Tim Dawson, a freelance organiser, said he “transformed the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ last golden age”.

Personal Life

In 2001 Harris made contact through a website with Nikki, whom he had initially encountered as a three-year-old in primary school, and they became close companions through his final decades. After learning of his illness, they went on a driving tour in Europe, sharing bright images of good meals and quality drinks, and revisiting important sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His final project, finished a few weeks before his death, was to transfer his vast archive of 55 years’ work to a long-term repository. Among his favourite archive images he commented on a youthful Harris consuming generous servings of wine with the actor Helen Mirren: “What a fortunate life I’ve had – no regrets and no ‘Must Do’s’”.

He was married 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.