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The photographer B. Harris, who passed away at the age of 73 from cancer, left school at 16 to become a messenger boy, and went on to become among the most esteemed UK photojournalists of his era.

An International Professional Journey

He journeyed across the globe as a freelance or a staffer for major British publications, covering such events as the collapse of the Berlin Wall, drought and hunger in Ethiopia and Sudan, the Troubles in Northern Ireland, war zones in the Balkan region and throughout Africa, the aftermath of the Falklands conflict and several US election campaigns. Additionally, he produced poetic scenic views of the countryside around his home county of Essex home.

By his own calculation he shot more than 2m photographs, averaging 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 short time before his death, and had been arranging to deliver a lecture on his career and experiences.

Notable Assignments

Tales from a turbulent career included an costly business class flight in 1991 to attend the funeral in India of the slain politician Rajiv Gandhi, where he fainted from heatstroke and pneumonia and was cooled down 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 sea on Brighton beach were carried across eight columns of a front page, and are often reprinted as a hideous 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 Times’ most youthful staff photographer when he started there in 1976, at the age of 26, and was based around the world for almost ten years, including reporting of the end of the civil war in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). He later stepped down over what he saw as editing of his strongest images of starvation in Africa.

In 1986 Harris became chief photographer as the team was put together to launch a new newspaper. He played a key role in forming the style of editorial photography that the paper became known for, helping raise the bar for press images and broadsheet design, in dramatic images filling multiple pages. Among numerous awards, he was honoured as the What the Papers Say photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in eastern Europe documenting the fall of communism.

He worked as a freelance after being made redundant in 1999, and significant projects after that 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 personal tour to the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh – and a emotional book, Remembered.

Early Life and Start

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

At a Fleet Street agency, he rose rapidly from delivery boy to photographer, and began his working life at eastern London local papers before moving on to major publications.

Colleagues and Legacy

Other photographers, often outpaced by him, recalled his work as remarkable. A colleague, who worked with him in the initial stages, called him “a great and fearless photographer”, an influence to a cohort of young colleagues. Another associate, a union representative, said he “reimagined the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ last golden age”.

Personal Life

In 2001 Harris reconnected through a online service with Nikki Bertroya, whom he had first met as a toddler in primary school, and they became inseparable partners through his final decades. After receiving his terminal diagnosis, they embarked on a road trip in Europe, sharing bright images of good meals and good wine, and returning to significant sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His final project, finished a few weeks before his death, was to donate his vast archive of 55 years’ work to a permanent home. Among his favourite archive images he commented on a youthful 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 survived by Nikki, his son Jacob, from his later union, Nikki’s daughter, Holly, and by his sister, Jan.