Esteemed Photographer Brian Harris Life Story: A Life Through the Camera

The photographer Brian Harris, who has died at the age of 73 from cancer, ended his schooling at 16 to become a messenger boy, and went on to become one of the most respected UK documentary photographers of his generation.

An International Career

He journeyed the world as a independent or a employee for Fleet Street titles, documenting major happenings including the collapse of the Berlin Wall, famine in Ethiopia and Sudan, the Troubles in Northern Ireland, war zones in the Balkan region and throughout Africa, the consequences of the Falklands conflict and several US election campaigns. Additionally, he produced lyrical scenic views of the countryside around his Essex home.

According to his estimates he shot more than two million photographs, averaging 100 a day, but he made that count some years back. He continued posting archive and new images each day on online platforms until a few weeks before his passing, and had been arranging to give a talk on his career and experiences.

Memorable Assignments

Tales from a rollercoaster career included an costly business class flight in 1991 to reach the burial in India of the slain politician 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 sea on Brighton beach were published across multiple columns of a leading page, and are often reprinted as a striking example of staged photo hubris. His 2016 memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, was named after an exasperated John Major hitting him with a folded briefing paper.

Professional Milestones

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 considered censorship of his strongest images of famine in Africa.

In 1986 Harris became chief photographer as the team was put together to create a new newspaper. He was instrumental in forming the style of editorial photography that the paper became known for, helping set new standards for news photography and broadsheet design, in dramatic images covering front and back pages. Among numerous awards, he was honoured as the What the Papers Say photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in the former Eastern Bloc recording the fall of communism.

He operated independently after being let go in 1999, and significant projects thereafter included a year spent capturing cemeteries across the world in 2006 for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, which led to an exhibition launched in London – where he gave a private viewing to the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh – and a moving book, Remembered.

Background and Beginnings

Harris was raised in eastern London, to Dorothy and Leonard Harris, an electrician who later helped his son construct a photo lab in the garage. In the 1950s, the family moved farther east – and to a better area – to the Rise Park estate in Romford, Essex. Brian attended a local secondary modern school, acquiring useful skills in carpentry and metal crafting, before leaving at 16.

At a central London agency, he rose rapidly from delivery boy to photographer, and began his professional career at east London local papers before moving on to national publications.

Peers and Impact

Fellow photographers, often outpaced by him, recalled his work as remarkable. Nick Turpin, who worked with him in the early days, called him “a superb and brave photographer”, an influence to a generation of junior colleagues. Tim Dawson, a union representative, said he “reimagined the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ last golden age”.

Personal Life

In 2001 Harris reconnected through a website with Nikki Bertroya, whom he had initially encountered as a three-year-old in primary school, and they became inseparable partners through his remaining years. After learning of his illness, they embarked on a road trip in Europe, posting sunny images of good meals and quality drinks, and returning to important sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His last task, completed a short time before his demise, was to transfer his vast archive of five decades of work to a long-term repository. Among his favourite historical photos he commented on a very young Harris consuming 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 married twice, both marriages concluded with divorce.

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