My first coverage of the Olympics was in Tokyo in 2021. Of course, it was amazing to photograph world class athletes but the real motivation was to document how they could be brought together from every corner of the earth to compete in the middle of a global pandemic. The idea seemed absurd. Yet they did and the 2020 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games that had been postponed until 2021 were an incredible success.
While most photographers went back to their home countries after the conclusion of the Tokyo Olympics I stayed on to cover the Paralympics. Perhaps my interest in these competitions comes from having a father who had a severe case of polio that never stopped him from having a rich productive life. Though he never heard them, I have no doubt that he would have agreed with the words of Premadasa Dissanayake who I photographed at the Tokyo 2020 Summer Paralympics: “What matters is not a person’s limbs, but the mental courage to face life.”
I ended up with countless tear sheets including a six page feature in Newsweek on Paralympians and my opening ceremonies’ shot won the Sports Photographer of the Year Award in the Venue category. Based on the success of that initial coverage, I was invited by ZUMA Press to join their team in Beijing for the 2022 Winter Olympics.
In an attempt to control the spread of the corona virus, the Olympics and Paralympics had all people associated with the Games stay and travel in Japan and China in a “bubble” – a complex web of hotels, athlete villages, buses and media centers as well as submit to daily Covid testing. After a period of quarantine, I was able to travel freely around Japan while in China it was a closed loop for the entirety of the Olympics and Paralympics and the time in-between. These efforts accomplished the desired results and gave the world powerful rays of light during the very dark days of the pandemic. It was vital in both countries for me to document as part of my coverage the procedures that were in place to bring out this positive outcome.
After photographing what I have dubbed “The Miracle Games” I’ve continued to cover the Olympics in France and most recently in Italy for ZUMA Press as we have moved past the pandemic and the crowds have returned to witness the greatest athletes on earth. My photographic approach has remained basically the same except that in 2022 I switched from Nikon DSLRs to Nikon’s mirrorless system. For the Games my go to set up is a Nikon Z9 loaded with DELKIN BLACK CFexpress TYPE B cards with a Z 400mm f/2.8 attached and a Z8 with a DELKIN BLACK CFexpress card and a DELKIN BLACK SDXC card with a Z 70-200mm f/2.8. I have a Think Tank rolling bag that also has a Nikkor Z 24-70mm f/2.8 and a Nikkor Z 14-24mm f/2.8. At the venues I put one or both of those lenses in a PressPass Sling bag and the rolling bag into a press room locker.
With the move to the mirrorless system I began to trust the Auto ISO for outdoor events in situations where the light is constantly changing and make quick adjustments with my exposure compensation if needed.
While the cloud of the pandemic has blown away, The XXV Winter Olympic Games, AKA Milano Cortina 2026, happened at a time where there were many international and domestic disputes with the Olympics once again becoming a shining light in a relatively dark time on the international stage. They bring nations together for healthy competition. This is nothing new. During the earliest Olympic Games, safe passage was guaranteed by the “ekecheiria” (Olympic Truce), an ancient Greek tradition beginning in the 8th century B.C. This truce required all regional conflicts to cease, ensuring athletes and spectators could travel securely to and from Olympia.
Every Olympics and Paralympics has its heroes and I’ve been fortunate enough to get many of them in my viewfinder from China’s Quan Hongchan on her way to a gold medal in the women’s 10-meter platform dive to Team USA gymnast Simone Biles going for the gold in Paris after having the “twisties” during the Tokyo 2020 Games. In addition to their incredible athletic abilities, all the athletes display an amazing ability to stay focused while the eyes of the world through countless lenses including mine are upon them.
For photographers, it’s vital for us to get out images to our respective agencies quickly otherwise they may end up in the “yesterday’s news” file. That’s why my friend and fellow photographer David Burnett said over noodles at midnight during the Tokyo Olympics that began on July 23, 2021 “We can sleep in September.” He wasn’t joking.
Assignments have taken Mark Edward Harris to more than 100 countries on all seven continents. His editorial work has appeared in publications such as Vanity Fair, LIFE, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Time Magazine, GEO, Newsweek, Conde Nast Traveler, National Geographic Traveler, Hemispheres, AFAR, Paris Match, VICE, Wallpaper, Vogue, Architectural Digest, The Los Angeles Times Magazine, and The London Sunday Times Travel Magazine as well as all the major photography and in-flight magazines. Among his numerous accolades are CLIO, ACE, Impact DOCS Award of Excellence, Aurora Gold, New York Book Show Book of the Year and IPA awards. His books include Faces of the Twentieth Century: Master Photographers and Their Work, The Way of the Japanese Bath, Wanderlust, North Korea, South Korea, Inside Iran, The Travel Photo Essay: Describing A Journey Through Images and his latest, The People of the Forest, a book about orangutans.
