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The photographer B. Harris, who has died at the age of 73 from cancer, ended his schooling at 16 to work as a courier, and eventually became among the most esteemed British photojournalists of his generation.

An International Career

He travelled the world as a freelance or a staffer for major British publications, covering major happenings including the fall of the Berlin Wall, famine in Ethiopia and Sudan, the Troubles in Northern Ireland, battlefields in the Balkan region and across Africa, the aftermath of the Falklands war and several US election campaigns. Additionally, he produced poetic landscapes of the rural areas around his Essex home.

According to his estimates he took more than two million images, taking an average of 100 a day, but he made that count several years ago. He continued posting historical 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 career and experiences.

Memorable Projects

Stories from a turbulent career included an costly premium flight in 1991 to reach the burial in India of the assassinated leader Rajiv Gandhi, where he collapsed from heatstroke and pneumonia and was cooled down 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, falling into the tide on Brighton beach were published across eight columns of a leading page, and are often reprinted as a hideous example of staged photo hubris. His 2016 memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, took the title from an exasperated John Major striking him with a folded 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 almost ten years, including coverage 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 starvation in Africa.

In 1986 Harris was made head photographer as the team was put together to create a major newspaper. He played a key role in shaping the style of editorial 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 honoured as the industry-recognised photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in eastern Europe documenting the collapse of communism.

He worked as a freelance after being let go 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 the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh – and a moving book, Remembered.

Background and Start

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

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

Colleagues and Legacy

Fellow photographers, often scooped by him, remembered his work as astonishing. A colleague, who collaborated with him in the initial stages, called him “a great and fearless photographer”, an influence to a generation of young 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 online service with Nikki Bertroya, whom he had first met as a three-year-old in primary school, and they became close companions through his remaining years. After learning of his illness, they went on a driving tour in Europe, sharing bright images of good meals and quality drinks, and revisiting significant sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His last task, finished a short time before his demise, was to donate his extensive collection of 55 years’ work to a permanent home. Among his preferred 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 regrets and no ‘Must Do’s’”.

He was wed twice, each union ended in divorce.

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