Ōtepoti Hip Hop Hustle is a multi-disciplinary mini arts festival embedded in the Dunedin Arts Festival, a day of music, dance, art, and high energy.

Nestled in the Dunedin Public Art Gallery’s car park, which has the perfect slope for watching a stage by the way, the set up drew the audience in, with food and drinks on one side and artists spraying giant canvases screwed to wooden frames, and the stage in perfect position for the crowd to stand in the sun and watch.

The festival claims to be whānau-friendly and this is very apparent, with beanbags sprinkled around, mostly with three or four young people and an occasional adult squishing together, lots of chat from the host MC encouraging people to show off their skills to get a party pack, and lots of inter-generational groups. There was one particularly charming tiny girl with headphones and a huge smile toddling around with her mama and her mama’s crew taking turns to follow devotedly.

RASA School of Dance has a heavy presence, with crews of dancers from primary school-age through to adult making appearances throughout the day. The performers are sharp, fun to watch, and they look like they’re having a great time which is always infectious (in a good non-pandemic way).

The MCs start early in the day – full disclosure I was only there until about 6.30pm with a drive by later on after another show – with Christian Tucker and Tali Joy (the only woman MC?) owning the stage as the first couple of acts. Optimist Mind gives strong Beastie Boys vibes with an Aotearoa message while Alexander Griffin was deep in his zone. Foul Play Syndicate – “the world’s most southern rap/hip hop group” – really took the stage to a new place though with lyrics falling over themselves and spinning into new places. I think this is about when the crowd started to move in time. I managed to find myself a sweet spot behind the sound desk and another one in front of a speaker where the sound could drive right through my body.

The graffiti battle was fast and clever. I’m not sure why people think graffiti art is vandalism or whatever dismissive term people are using for it these days. Watching the speed those artists were moving, tracing outlines of their work onto the canvas and filling in the space until the image in their mind’s eye is replicated for everyone else to see – the process is the same as the one that created any canvas hanging in any gallery and they work fast and so elegantly. It’s almost like watching a dancer, the way their bodies move rhythmically as their arms and hands reach out towards their imagination.

When I drove by again later, dusk had fallen and the crowd had changed and the beats were heavier and louder. It gives such a ‘proper city’ feel to have an event like this reverberating around the CBD.

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