I have been painting two series of portraits, one of personal heroes, the other of people who have committed suicide. Someone asked me if it were possible for one person to be both. Unfortunately, it is. Aaron Hillel Swartz (November 8, 1986 – January 11, 2013) is part of both series.

If you use the internet, especially if you use Reddit, Facebook or almost any news websites, you have benefited by using code and/or protocols written by Aaron Swartz. He was a world-renowned hacktivist, political organizer, computer programmer, entrepreneur and writer; all this in his teens and twenties. He was co-founder of Reddit. He authored RSS 1.0 for sharing news stories. He was instrumental in creating Creative Commons to facilitate sharing of copyrighted material on the web. He advocated for and facilitated a more open web. To that end, he also organized campaigns against bills that would make the internet costly and less egalitarian.

In 2011, Swartz was arrested by Massachusetts Institute of Technology Police on state breaking-and-entering charges, after connecting a computer to the MIT network in an unmarked and unlocked closet, and setting it to download articles using a guest user account issued to him by MIT. Federal prosecutors later charged him with two counts of wire fraud and eleven violations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, carrying a maximum penalty of $1 million in fines, 35 years in prison, asset forfeiture, restitution, and supervised release. In January 2013, he was offered a plea bargain for six months in federal prison. He made a counter offer. Two days after that was rejected, he was found dead in his Brooklyn apartment He had hanged himself. He was 26. Later that year he was inducted into the Internet Hall of Fame.

“This is your life, this is your country – and if you want to keep it safe, you need to get involved.”

“Be curious. Read widely. Try new things. What people call intelligence just boils down to curiosity.”
– Aaron Swartz

I painted this portrait in black on white to represent binary, which is what all computer code comes down to. It is larger than life at 24″ x 24″. The sides of the gallery wrapped canvas are red, so no framing is necessary. I painted the name and my signature on the edge, because I wanted to keep the portrait clean and simple.

It is acrylic on 24″ x 24″ stretched canvas.

Price: $320 plus postage.

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