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The photojournalist B. Harris, who passed away aged 73 of cancer, ended his schooling at 16 to work as a courier, and eventually became one of the most respected British photojournalists of his generation.

An International Career

He travelled across the globe as a independent or a staffer for major British publications, documenting major happenings including the collapse of the Berlin Wall, famine in Ethiopia and Sudan, the conflict in Northern Ireland, battlefields in the Balkan region and across Africa, the aftermath of the Falklands conflict and several US election campaigns. Additionally, he produced poetic scenic views of the rural areas around his Essex home.

By his own calculation he shot over 2m images, averaging 100 a day, but he stated that figure some years back. He continued posting archive and new images each day on social media up to a few weeks before his death, and had been arranging to deliver a lecture on his life and work.

Notable Projects

Tales from a turbulent career featured an costly business class flight in 1991 to attend the funeral in India of the assassinated leader Rajiv Gandhi, where he fainted from heatstroke and pneumonia and was cooled down with ice that had been employed to cool the body.

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

Career Milestones

He became the a major newspaper’s most youthful staff photographer when he started there in 1976, at the age of 26, and was based around the world for nearly a decade, including reporting of the end of the civil war 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 became chief photographer as the team was put together to create a new newspaper. He played a key role in shaping the style of editorial photography that the paper became known for, helping raise the bar for press images and newspaper design, in striking images filling multiple pages. Among numerous awards, he was honoured as the industry-recognised 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 major 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 personal tour to the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh – and a emotional book, Remembered.

Background and Start

Harris was born in eastern London, to Dorothy and Leonard Harris, an electrician who later helped his son construct a darkroom in the garage. In the 1950s, the family relocated eastwards – and to a better area – to the Rise Park estate in Romford, Essex. Brian attended Chase Cross secondary modern school, acquiring practical skills in carpentry and metalwork, before leaving at 16.

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

Peers and Legacy

Other photographers, often outpaced by him, remembered his work as astonishing. A colleague, who worked with him in the early days, described him as “a superb and fearless photographer”, an influence to a cohort of junior colleagues. Another associate, a freelance organiser, said he “reimagined the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ peak era”.

Personal Life

In 2001 Harris reconnected through a online service with Nikki, whom he had initially encountered as a toddler in primary school, and they became inseparable partners through his final decades. After receiving his terminal diagnosis, they embarked on a driving tour in Europe, sharing sunny images of good meals and quality drinks, and revisiting significant sites including Dresden and Ypres.

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

He was married twice, both marriages concluded with divorce.

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