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The photojournalist Brian Harris, who has died at the age of 73 from cancer, left school at 16 to work as a courier, and eventually became one of the most respected UK photojournalists of his generation.

An International Professional Journey

He travelled the world as a freelance or a employee for major British publications, documenting major happenings including the collapse of the Berlin Wall, famine in Ethiopia and Sudan, the Troubles in Northern Ireland, war zones in the Balkans and across Africa, the consequences of the Falklands conflict and several US presidential campaigns. He also created poetic scenic views of the countryside around his home county of Essex home.

By his own calculation he shot more than two million images, averaging 100 a day, but he stated that figure some years back. He continued posting archive and recent images each day on social media up to a short time before his death, and had been arranging to give a talk on his life and work.

Memorable Projects

Tales from a rollercoaster career featured an costly premium flight in 1991 to attend the burial in India of the slain politician Rajiv Gandhi, where he fainted 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, falling into the sea on Brighton beach were carried across eight columns of a leading page, and are regularly reproduced as a striking example of staged photo hubris. His 2016’s memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, was named after an exasperated John Major striking him with a rolled-up briefing paper.

Career Highlights

He was appointed as 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 internal conflict in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). He later stepped down over what he saw as censorship of his strongest images of starvation in Africa.

In 1986 Harris became chief photographer as the team was assembled to launch a major newspaper. He played a key role in shaping the style of editorial photography that the paper became known for, helping set new standards for press images and newspaper design, in striking images covering multiple pages. Among numerous awards, he was named the industry-recognised photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in the former Eastern Bloc recording the collapse of communism.

He worked as a freelance 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 exhibition launched in London – where he gave a personal tour to the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh – and a moving book, Remembered.

Background and Start

Harris was raised in eastern London, to Dorothy and Leonard Harris, an technician who later helped his son build a darkroom in the garage. In the 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 leaving at 16.

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

Colleagues and Impact

Fellow photographers, often outpaced by him, remembered his work as remarkable. Nick Turpin, who worked with him in the early days, described him as “a great and brave photographer”, an influence to a cohort of junior colleagues. Another associate, a union representative, said he “reimagined the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ last golden age”.

Private World

In 2001 Harris made contact through a website with Nikki, whom he had initially encountered as a three-year-old in infant school, and they became inseparable partners through his final decades. After receiving his terminal diagnosis, they went on a road trip in Europe, posting bright images of fine dining and quality drinks, and revisiting important sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His last task, finished a short time before his death, was to transfer his vast archive of five decades of work to a permanent home. Among his preferred archive images he commented on a youthful Harris drinking large glasses 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 second marriage, Nikki’s daughter, Holly, and by his sister, Jan.