Art is a way to express yourself and through that you can escape

Host: The city outside was bruised in twilight, its skyline a silhouette of ambition and exhaustion. Down below, in a forgotten corner of a half-abandoned warehouse, light spilled through a cracked window — gold and broken, the kind that catches in the dust and refuses to leave.

Inside, the walls were covered in layers of graffiti, old paintings, torn posters, and half-finished murals. The air smelled of spray paint, turpentine, and a hint of smoke from the candle burning in an old tin can.

At the center of it all sat Jack, a paintbrush in one hand and a cigarette in the other. His shirt was streaked with color — red, blue, gray — the hues of a man trying to bleed quietly onto the walls. Across the room, Jeeny stood barefoot, her camera hanging from her neck, her eyes following the brushstrokes like a believer watching confession.

The music playing from a cracked speaker was soft, lo-fi — the heartbeat of dreamers who refused to die quietly.

Jeeny: “You paint like you’re angry.”

Jack: not looking up “I paint so I don’t stay angry.”

Jeeny: “Russell Simmons once said, ‘Art is a way to express yourself, and through that you can escape a bad situation.’ I think he was talking about you.”

Jack: “Or maybe he was talking to people like me — the ones who don’t know what else to do with the noise in their heads.”

Jeeny: smiling faintly “Then make it music.”

Jack: shrugs “Paint’s cheaper.”

Host: The candle flame flickered, bending toward him, catching the edge of his face — sweat, exhaustion, and something beautiful beneath it. The wall in front of him was chaos and harmony in equal parts: faces, symbols, fragments of words that didn’t need order to mean something.

Jeeny: “What are you painting?”

Jack: “Escape.”

Jeeny: “From what?”

Jack: after a pause “From everything that won’t stop following me when the lights go out.”

Jeeny: “You mean the past.”

Jack: “I mean the kind of silence that hurts.”

Host: Her camera clicked, the sound sharp and sacred in the quiet. The flash caught him mid-stroke — brush frozen in air, eyes dark, jaw tight.

Jeeny: “You ever realize that every time you paint, you stop talking?”

Jack: “That’s the point. Talking never saved anyone.”

Jeeny: “You think painting does?”

Jack: looking up, meeting her eyes “It saves me.”

Host: The words hung there, trembling, honest. The kind of truth that doesn’t need to be profound to be powerful.

Jeeny set her camera down and walked closer, her bare feet brushing against scattered paint tubes.

Jeeny: “You know, that’s what I love about artists. You all think you’re escaping something, but really... you’re just translating it.”

Jack: grinning faintly “And photographers? What are you escaping?”

Jeeny: “Reality. Just long enough to make it look worth remembering.”

Host: The sound of the city drifted through the cracked window — sirens, horns, laughter from a bar down the street. It was all part of the same symphony: chaos dressed as life.

Jack stepped back to look at his work. The mural stretched across the concrete like a living wound — wild, imperfect, alive.

Jeeny: softly “It’s beautiful.”

Jack: “It’s pain with color.”

Jeeny: “Same thing.”

Jack: smiles “You think art really lets you escape?”

Jeeny: “Not forever. But long enough to breathe again.”

Host: The rain began — soft, almost polite, tapping against the broken panes of glass. A few drops found their way in, landing on the mural, smearing the fresh paint into tears. Neither of them moved to stop it.

Jack: “Every time I finish something, it feels like I’ve left a piece of myself behind.”

Jeeny: “That’s because you have.”

Jack: “And one day, I won’t have any pieces left.”

Jeeny: “Then you’ll start making new ones.”

Jack: smirking “You sound like a therapist.”

Jeeny: “No. Just someone who’s learning how to breathe through art, too.”

Host: She walked to the far wall and touched one of his older paintings — a silhouette of a man walking toward a rising sun. The colors were cracked, faded by time, but the message was still alive.

Jeeny: “You ever notice how your art’s always leaving? Like every figure you paint is walking away from something?”

Jack: “That’s what survival looks like.”

Jeeny: “Or maybe redemption.”

Jack: “Same thing, just with better lighting.”

Host: The candle guttered. The rain deepened. The whole room felt like a heartbeat — steady, alive, fragile.

Jeeny sat beside him now, pulling her knees close.

Jeeny: “You think people can actually escape through what they create?”

Jack: “I think they can return through it. To themselves.”

Jeeny: “You sound like a preacher tonight.”

Jack: laughs quietly “Maybe artists are just preachers who can’t find words.”

Jeeny: “And maybe art’s the sermon.”

Host: The silence that followed was rich — filled with the hum of creation, the promise of color, the ghost of healing. Jack’s brush moved again, slower now, gentler. Each stroke seemed like an apology to the parts of himself he’d neglected.

Jeeny watched, whispering almost to herself.

Jeeny: “Do you ever think about what your life would’ve been without art?”

Jack: without pausing “Shorter.”

Jeeny: “You mean darker.”

Jack: “Same thing.”

Host: The camera would have pulled back slowly — the warehouse glowing with the muted halo of candlelight and rain, the two of them small but infinite within it.

The mural now complete: a door painted in the middle of chaos, half-open, leading to nothing but light.

Jeeny stood, stepping closer to admire it.

Jeeny: “That’s it, isn’t it? The escape.”

Jack: nodding “Yeah. But not away from life — into it.”

Jeeny: “So you paint to find it.”

Jack: “To feel it. To prove it’s still there.”

Host: The rain began to ease, leaving the city washed and tender. The candle finally burned out, but the mural glowed faintly in the last light of dusk — a testament not to perfection, but to persistence.

And somewhere in the quiet, Russell Simmons’ truth seemed to echo through the paint fumes and the heartbeat of two souls refusing to surrender:

“Art is a way to express yourself, and through that you can escape a bad situation.”

Host: The camera lingered on the mural — the painted door, the suggestion of light, the small, stubborn hope that art had built between them.

Because in that dim, forgotten room — amid paint, ruin, and rain — Jack and Jeeny had done what only artists can do.

They hadn’t escaped life.
They’d re-entered it —
one color, one breath, one act of creation at a time.