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The photojournalist B. Harris, who passed away at the age of 73 from cancer, ended his schooling at 16 to work as a courier, and went on to become one of the most respected UK documentary photographers of his generation.

An International Career

He travelled across the globe as a independent or a employee for major British publications, covering such events as the fall of the Berlin Wall, drought and hunger in Ethiopia and Sudan, the conflict in Northern Ireland, battlefields in the Balkan region and across Africa, the consequences of the Falklands war and four US election campaigns. Additionally, he produced poetic landscapes of the rural areas around his Essex home.

By his own calculation he shot more than two million photographs, averaging 100 a day, but he made that count some years back. He kept sharing archive and new images each day on social media up to a short time before his death, and had been arranging to deliver a lecture on his life and work.

Memorable Projects

Stories from a rollercoaster career included an expenses-shredding premium flight in 1991 to attend the burial in India of the slain politician Rajiv Gandhi, where he collapsed from heatstroke and pneumonia and was treated with ice that had been employed to cool the body.

His 1983 images of the at that time Labour party leader Neil Kinnock with his wife, Glenys, toppling into the tide on Brighton beach were published across multiple columns of a front page, and are often reprinted as a striking example of photo-opportunity hubris. His 2016 memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, was named after an irritated John Major hitting him with a rolled-up briefing paper.

Professional 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 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 editing of his strongest images of famine in Africa.

In 1986 Harris was made head photographer as the team was put together to launch a new newspaper. He was instrumental in shaping the style of journalistic photography that the paper became known for, helping set new standards for press images and broadsheet design, in dramatic images covering front and back pages. Among many awards, he was named the What the Papers Say photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in eastern Europe recording the collapse of communism.

He worked as a freelance after being made redundant in 1999, and significant projects thereafter included a year spent capturing cemeteries across the world in 2006 for the war memorial organisation, which resulted in an display launched in London – where he gave a private viewing to the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh – and a emotional book, Remembered.

Background and Beginnings

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

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

Colleagues and Legacy

Other photographers, often outpaced by him, recalled his work as astonishing. Nick Turpin, who collaborated with him in the initial stages, called him “a superb and brave photographer”, an influence to a generation of junior colleagues. Another associate, a union representative, said he “reimagined the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ peak era”.

Personal Life

In 2001 Harris reconnected through a website with Nikki, whom he had initially encountered as a toddler in infant school, and they became close companions through his final decades. After learning of his illness, they embarked on a driving tour in Europe, sharing sunny images of good meals and good wine, and returning to significant sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His final project, completed a few weeks before his demise, was to donate his extensive collection of 55 years’ work to a permanent home. Among his favourite historical photos he commented on a youthful Harris drinking generous servings 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 concluded with divorce.

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