Brian Harris Life Story: An Existence Behind the Lens

The photographer Brian Harris, who has died aged 73 from cancer, ended his schooling at 16 to work as a courier, and eventually became one of the most respected British photojournalists of his era.

A Global Professional Journey

He travelled across the globe as a freelance or a employee for Fleet Street publications, covering such events as the fall of the Berlin Wall, famine in Ethiopia and Sudan, the conflict in Northern Ireland, battlefields in the Balkan region and throughout Africa, the consequences of the Falklands war and several US presidential campaigns. Additionally, he produced poetic landscapes of the countryside around his home county of Essex home.

According to his estimates he took over 2m photographs, taking an average of 100 a day, but he made that count some years back. He kept sharing archive and recent images each day on social media up to a short time before his passing, and had been planning to deliver a lecture on his life and work.

Memorable Assignments

Stories from a turbulent career included an expenses-shredding premium flight in 1991 to reach 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 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 often reprinted as a hideous example of staged photo hubris. His 2016 memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, was named after an irritated John Major striking him with a rolled-up briefing paper.

Professional Highlights

He became the a major newspaper’s youngest ever staff photographer when he joined the paper in 1976, at the age of 26, and worked around the world for nearly a decade, including reporting of the end of the civil war in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). He eventually resigned over what he considered editing of his strongest images of starvation 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 shaping the style of journalistic photography that the paper became known for, helping set new standards for press images and newspaper design, in striking images covering front and back 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 worked as a freelance after being made redundant in 1999, and major projects thereafter included a year spent capturing 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 Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh – and a moving book, Remembered.

Early Life and Beginnings

Harris was raised in east London, to Dorothy and Leonard Harris, an electrician who later assisted him build a photo lab in the garage. In the mid 1950s, the family relocated farther east – and to a better area – to the Rise Park housing estate in Romford, Essex. Brian went to a local secondary modern school, learning practical skills in carpentry and metalwork, before leaving at 16.

At a Fleet Street photo agency, he quickly advanced from delivery boy to photographer, and began his working life at eastern London local papers before progressing to national publications.

Colleagues and Legacy

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 superb and brave photographer”, an inspiration to a generation of junior colleagues. Another associate, a union representative, said he “transformed the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ last golden age”.

Personal Life

In 2001 Harris reconnected through a online service with Nikki, whom he had first met as a three-year-old in primary school, and they became close companions through his remaining years. After receiving his terminal diagnosis, they embarked on a road trip in Europe, sharing bright images of fine dining and quality drinks, and returning to significant sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His final project, finished a few weeks before his death, was to donate his extensive collection of five decades of work to a permanent home. Among his preferred historical photos he commented on a youthful Harris drinking 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 ended in divorce.

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