My friend Andy Hardy, who has died aged 50 of pneumonia, was a dancer, choreographer, music composer, film-maker and disabled rights activist.
Andy was born with cerebral palsy and was raised in west London by his mother, Rose, who would not allow attitudes to disability to prevent her son from enjoying a full and adventurous childhood. Andy did not have speech but was exceptionally close to his brother, Kevin, and could communicate with him using just a gesture or a glance.
On leaving school, Andy moved into a care home where he lived for the next 10 years. Andy found these years deeply frustrating, and felt he was being stifled by life in residential care. Never one to shy away from taking matters into his own hands, he ran away from the home with the help of the Direct Action Network, escaping in the back of a friend’s van. He did not return.
Andy got very involved with DAN actions and protests, and in the 1990s spent a night in the cells for chaining himself to a bus while campaigning for disabled access. As Andy himself was to write, “You cannot be anything but rebellious when you live the social model of disability.” This activism continued right up to his recent protest outside Westminster Abbey against cuts to benefits for disabled people.
Andy studied music and digital technologies, as well as theatre lighting. He worked with the Drake Music project on programmes to make music more accessible to musicians with impairments, and worked with Jools Holland and Eddie Parker at the O2 Arena. Andy was also a talented photographer and film-maker, and made two short experimental films, one of them about wheelchair football. He was himself the subject of a short documentary film, A Life Well Lived, by the Iranian film-maker Roya Keshavarz.
In 2009 Andy began composing for the Amici dance company. Through this, he developed a love of dance and performance. Shortly before his death, he had begun a dance degree at the University of Roehampton. He made an immediate impact there, with his spirited personality and desire to push the boundaries and image of the body in relation to dance. Andy produced some impressive pieces of work, often gaining firsts, and a bright future in dance seemed certain.
Andy will be remembered for his great sense of humour, his single-minded determination to challenge barriers to life and to art, and for his beaming smile.
Rose died in 2013. Andy is survived by his partner Bruce Ashby, whom he married in 2011, Kevin and by his stepfather, Gordon.