I see myself and many artists like me as the torchbearers through

Host: The gallery lights flickered softly, casting long, trembling reflections on the polished concrete floor. Paintings — some vivid, some ghostly — lined the walls like memories half-remembered. The air smelled of turpentine, old canvas, and quiet rebellion. Outside, the city was a blur of neon and fog, humming with its own anxious heartbeat.

In the center of the room, Jack stood before a massive abstract piece — streaks of crimson and black clawed across the canvas like a scream frozen midair. He said nothing. He didn’t have to. His silence carried the weight of every artist who’d ever wondered if their light still mattered.

Jeeny entered quietly, her boots echoing softly on the concrete. She held a small notebook, edges frayed, pages stained with ink. She looked at the painting, then at Jack, and spoke in that calm, deliberate tone she used when words were a bridge and not a weapon.

Jeeny: reading softly from her notebook
“John Zorn once said, ‘I see myself and many artists like me as the torchbearers through these dark ages.’”

Jack: without turning
“Dark ages. Yeah. That about sums it up.”

Jeeny: moving closer, her eyes tracing the brushstrokes
“He didn’t mean medieval darkness, Jack. He meant this — the noise, the numbness, the shallow kind of light that blinds instead of reveals.”

Jack: quietly
“Still feels medieval. Just with better Wi-Fi.”

Host: The lights hummed overhead, their glow flickering like the last flame of a candle fighting the wind. Somewhere in the distance, a car horn blared — sharp, lonely — and was swallowed again by the night.

Jeeny: softly, almost to herself
“Artists as torchbearers… it’s a heavy calling, isn’t it? Carrying light through a world that forgets how to see.”

Jack: turning to her finally, his eyes tired but burning with something deeper
“Yeah. We paint, sing, write — and half the time it feels like we’re whispering into a storm. But if we stop, who keeps the fire alive?”

Jeeny: meeting his gaze, her voice gentle but firm
“Maybe that’s what Zorn meant. That art isn’t decoration — it’s endurance. The torch isn’t there to make the darkness pretty. It’s there to remind us the dark can’t win.”

Host: The gallery felt alive now, as if the walls themselves were listening. Every color, every brushstroke, seemed to hum faintly with purpose — defiance against despair.

Jack: walking slowly past the paintings, his voice distant
“Sometimes I think we romanticize it — the idea of the suffering artist, the noble torchbearer. But the truth? It’s exhausting. Carrying light burns.”

Jeeny: nodding
“It does. But it also warms. And it leads. The world may not thank you for it — but someone, somewhere, is following your light out of their own dark.”

Jack: stopping, his voice quieter now
“You sound like you still believe in art’s salvation.”

Jeeny: smiling faintly
“I believe in its honesty. Art doesn’t fix the world — it reveals it. And sometimes that’s enough.”

Host: The wind howled faintly against the glass windows, pressing shadows across the floor like dark waves. The city outside pulsed — cold, electric, unaware of the small miracle happening in the quiet room where two souls still believed in light.

Jack: softly, turning back to the painting
“You ever think artists are cursed? We feel too much, see too deep, bleed too easily.”

Jeeny: stepping closer, her voice full of warmth and gravity
“Maybe that’s not a curse. Maybe it’s grace. Someone has to feel what the world refuses to feel — someone has to keep watch when everyone else sleeps.”

Jack: after a long pause, a faint, weary smile
“The watchmen of beauty.”

Jeeny: nodding softly
“And of truth. Of pain. Of everything people hide from themselves.”

Host: The lights dimmed further, the gallery reduced to a faint glow that caught the outlines of their faces — one shadowed by cynicism, the other lit by conviction. Between them, the painting seemed to pulse — a wounded sun refusing to go out.

Jeeny: after a moment, softly
“When Zorn called artists torchbearers, he wasn’t praising us. He was warning us. Carrying light means you’ll always walk closest to the dark.”

Jack: quietly, eyes fixed on the painting
“Yeah. But maybe that’s where the truth lives. In the places no one else wants to go.”

Jeeny: smiling faintly
“Exactly. The artist’s job isn’t to escape the dark — it’s to translate it. To give it shape, sound, meaning. To make it survivable.”

Jack: turning toward her, his voice softer, almost reverent
“Do you really think it makes a difference? All this — the words, the colors, the music?”

Jeeny: without hesitation
“Yes. Because in every age, someone thought the world was ending — and still, art was born. That’s how I know the light never dies.”

Host: The room fell silent. The hum of the lights, the faint murmur of rain outside, the rhythmic pulse of human faith — all fused into a single, fragile stillness.

Jack: after a long pause, his voice low, full of reflection
“Maybe the point isn’t to change the world. Maybe it’s just to keep it from forgetting it’s still beautiful.”

Jeeny: softly
“That’s what torchbearers do. They don’t conquer the night — they walk through it, so others can see the path.”

Host: The camera would circle slowly, catching the gleam of wet pavement outside, the faint glow of city lights reflected in the gallery’s glass. Two figures stood still before a painting that burned like a wound and a promise.

And in that fragile silence, John Zorn’s words resonated not as arrogance, but as inheritance —
a vow spoken by every soul who’s ever dared to create in the face of decay:

That art is the fragile flame we carry through our collective darkness.
That beauty is resistance, and creation is survival.
And that to make art in the ruins of the world is to remind the ruins they once were alive.

Jeeny: softly, almost whispering
“So, Jack… you still think the torch is worth carrying?”

Jack: after a long pause, a faint smile
“Yeah. Even if it burns my hands — it’s the only thing that keeps me warm.”

Host: The rain outside turned to snow, silent and steady. Inside, the last light in the gallery glowed like a heartbeat in the dark — proof that, even now,
the torch was still burning.