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The photojournalist Brian Harris, who passed away aged 73 of cancer, ended his schooling at 16 to work as a courier, and went on to become among the most esteemed UK documentary photographers of his era.

A Global Career

He journeyed across the globe as a freelance or a staffer for Fleet Street titles, documenting such events as the collapse of the Berlin Wall, famine in Ethiopia and Sudan, the conflict in Northern Ireland, battlefields in the Balkans and throughout Africa, the aftermath of the Falklands war and several US election campaigns. He also created lyrical landscapes of the rural areas around his Essex home.

By his own calculation he took over 2m images, taking an average of 100 a day, but he stated that figure some years back. He continued posting historical and new images each day on online platforms until a short time before his passing, and had been arranging to give a talk on his life and work.

Memorable Projects

Stories from a rollercoaster career included an costly business class flight in 1991 to attend the funeral in India of the assassinated leader 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 at that time Labour party leader Neil Kinnock with his wife, Glenys, toppling into the sea on Brighton beach were published across eight columns of a front page, and are regularly reproduced as a hideous example of photo-opportunity hubris. His 2016’s memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, took the title from 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 started there in 1976, at the age of 26, and worked 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 saw as censorship of his most powerful images of famine in Africa.

In 1986 Harris was made head photographer as the team was assembled to launch a major newspaper. He was instrumental in shaping the style of editorial photography that the paper became known for, helping raise the bar for news photography and newspaper design, in striking images filling multiple pages. Among many awards, he was honoured as the industry-recognised photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in the former Eastern Bloc documenting the collapse of communism.

He operated independently after being let go in 1999, and major projects thereafter included a year spent photographing cemeteries across the world in 2006 for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, which resulted in an exhibition launched in London – where he gave a private viewing to the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh – and a emotional book, Remembered.

Early Life and Start

Harris was born in eastern London, to Dorothy and Leonard Harris, an electrician who later assisted him construct a photo lab in the garage. In the mid 1950s, the family moved farther east – and to a better area – to the Rise Park estate in Romford, Essex. Brian went to a local secondary modern school, learning useful skills in woodwork and metal crafting, before leaving at 16.

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

Peers and Legacy

Other photographers, often outpaced by him, remembered his work as remarkable. Nick Turpin, who collaborated with him in the initial stages, described him as “a great and fearless photographer”, an inspiration to a cohort 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 made contact through a online service with Nikki, whom he had first met as a toddler in infant school, and they became close companions through his final decades. After receiving his terminal diagnosis, they embarked on a driving tour in Europe, sharing bright images of fine dining and good wine, and revisiting significant sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His final project, finished a short time before his demise, was to transfer his vast archive of five decades of work to a permanent home. Among his favourite historical photos he reflected on a youthful Harris consuming generous servings of wine with the actor Helen Mirren: “What a fortunate life I’ve had – no remorse and no ‘Must Do’s’”.

He was wed twice, both marriages ended in divorce.

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