battle | Mosca Media

Written by Liza Moscatelli

Whether you love your music or art there was definitely something for you at Secret Walls at the Oxford Art Factory. Secret Walls resurrected Sydney on a Wednesday night where we all came to see two amazing artists battle (with their artistic skills), TEEM versus VEKS. It was the first time I have ever been to Secret Walls. As anticipated I loved it. One of my mates commented ‘I went last time and it was really good, but this one is even better’.

The concept of Secret Walls (formerly known as Secret Wars) originated in East London in the UK, Europe and has now expanded to Australia. It has been used as a platform and another way of self-expression for artists from all kinds of creative backgrounds, whether it is graphic design, illustration, writing and the like. There has been such a positive response worldwide that it has grown since its birth.

The venue had filled up in no time, full of creative people (perhaps even hipster-like) from various cultural backgrounds that came together that night to see Teem versus Veks battle it out. We were on time to see Melbourne based hip hop artist Zulu Flow Zion perform. As one knows Zulu lives and breaths Hip Hop, and as anticipated he did an awesome set with a combination of hip hop and reggae jams keeping the crowd entertained before the live art battle began. Zulu Flow and friend Joe Mooney who deejayed (also came down from Melbourne) even had us doing 180′s back and forth as the audience watched them spit rhymes so fast, that even the speed of light would envy. At one stage I had no idea what they were saying but all I knew was that they got some serious skills!

After Zulu Flow, Creative Director and MC on the night, Shannon McKinnon introduced the artists TEEM and VEKS. Both artists had a 90 minute period and were only to use black acrylic paints and black markers on blank white walls. The battle began. On the left wall we saw Veks and on the right-hand side was Teem. Veks started off by drawing two simple shapes (circles) which eventually formed into more intricate shapes, lines and shading and appeared to become something like a character out of a Transformers movie. His illustration was named ‘VEKSATRON’ with captions ‘The Paint Spillin, Teem Killin’. I grew fond of Veks’ illustration. On the opposite side Teem was working on his comic-like representation of himself. He was kind enough to include Veks in his illustration, only to realise later that Teem was about to eat Veks almost literally (double meaning here). His caption read ‘Start Your Day With Vitaveks’.

90 minutes were up and it was time to decide who would win the battle. There were three judges and the audience cheers were measured with a decibel reader. The reading presented with equal results for the first time ever and had to be done again. It was a tight battle and the winner was Teem. It was an emotional win for Teem having his family alongside to support him. Teem and Veks exchanged hugs which was nice to see. Great effort by both artists and well deserved win by Teem.

Congratulations Teem, from the team at Mosca Media Australia!