🔗 Share this article Brian Harris Life Story: An Existence Through the Camera The photographer Brian Harris, who has died aged 73 of cancer, ended his schooling at 16 to work as a courier, and went on to become among the most esteemed British photojournalists of his era. A Global Career He travelled the world as a freelance or a staffer for major British publications, documenting such events as the fall of the Berlin Wall, drought and hunger in Ethiopia and Sudan, the Troubles in Northern Ireland, war zones in the Balkans and throughout Africa, the aftermath of the Falklands conflict and four US presidential campaigns. He also created poetic landscapes of the rural areas around his home county of Essex home. According to his estimates he took more than two million images, taking an average of 100 a day, but he stated that figure several years ago. He kept sharing historical and recent images each day on online platforms up to a few weeks before his death, and had been planning to deliver a lecture on his career and experiences. Notable Projects Tales from a rollercoaster career included an costly business class flight in 1991 to reach the burial in India of the assassinated leader Rajiv Gandhi, where he fainted from sunstroke 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, toppling into the sea on Brighton beach were carried across eight columns of a leading page, and are often reprinted as a hideous example of staged photo hubris. His 2016’s memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, was named after an irritated 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 coverage of the end of the internal conflict in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). He eventually resigned over what he considered censorship of his most powerful images of famine in Africa. In 1986 Harris became chief photographer as the team was put together to create a major newspaper. He played a key role in forming the style of journalistic photography that the paper became known for, helping set new standards for news photography and broadsheet design, in striking images covering front and back pages. Among many awards, he was named the industry-recognised photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in eastern Europe recording the fall 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 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 moving book, Remembered. Background and Beginnings Harris was born in eastern London, to Dorothy and Leonard Harris, an technician who later helped his son construct a photo lab in the garage. In the mid 1950s, the family moved farther east – and to a better area – to the Rise Park housing estate in Romford, Essex. Brian attended a local secondary modern school, acquiring practical skills in carpentry and metal crafting, before departing at 16. At a central London photo agency, he rose rapidly from messenger boy to photographer, and launched his working life at east London local papers before progressing to national publications. Peers and Impact Fellow photographers, often scooped by him, recalled his work as remarkable. Nick Turpin, who collaborated with him in the initial stages, described him as “a superb and brave photographer”, an influence to a generation of junior colleagues. Another associate, a freelance organiser, said he “reimagined the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ last golden age”. Private World In 2001 Harris reconnected through a online service with Nikki Bertroya, whom he had first met as a three-year-old in primary school, and they became inseparable partners through his final decades. After receiving his terminal diagnosis, they went on a driving tour in Europe, posting bright images of good meals and good wine, and returning to significant sites including Dresden and Ypres. His last task, finished a few weeks before his demise, was to transfer his vast archive of five decades of work to a permanent home. Among his favourite historical photos he reflected on a very young Harris consuming large glasses of wine with the actor Helen Mirren: “What a blessed life I’ve had – no regrets and no ‘Must Do’s’”. He was wed twice, each union ended in divorce. He is remembered by Nikki, his son Jacob, from his second marriage, Nikki’s daughter, Holly, and by his sister, Jan.