In his role as Festival Artist Gino has been drawing and painting the authors who come to the Buckingham Literary Festival. The portraits create a living archive of both the activities of authors and the role of the Literary Festival. Language and voices interest Gino and the archive portrays the diverse nature of communication, both complex and cultural as authors bring their creative ideas to life and connect with an audience.
The authors Gino Has drawn and painted to date include:
(2025)
(2024)
(2023)
(2022) Alison Weir, Cath Howe, Christina Lamb, Ed Stourton, Emma Smith, Flora Fraser, Flora Rees Harry Baker, Iain Daie, Jonathan Sumption, Kenan Malik, Matt Stadlen, Mini Grey, Sam Fowles, Vanessa Horton, Violet Moller, Will Gompertz, Will Shakespeare, Yaw Asiyama, Gino Ballantyne -self portrait
2019 Authors: Adrian Wooldridge, Alison Baverstock, Annabel Leventon, Annabelle Dowler, Charles Cumming, Charles Ellingworth, Christopher lee, Conn Iggulden, Elif Shafak, Euan Cameron, Fanny Blake, Filipe Fernandez-Armesto, Georgina Godwin, Jane Wenham-Jones, Julie Summers, Kathy Slack, Leslie Cavendish, Local Authors Hub, Louis De Bernieres, Luke Jennings, Maggie Gee, Mathew Stadlen, Nick Hewer, Omar Meziane, Sir Anthony Seldon, Sunny Ormonde, Susannah Stapleton,Terry Waite, The Archers, Victoria Hislop, Violet Moller
(2018) Frederick Forsyth, Rebecca Fraser, Tim Marshall, Edward Stourton, Tom Bower, Jasper Winn, Anthony Seldon, William Sitwell, Natasha O'Hear & Anthony O'Hear, Antonia Fraser, Ben Okri, Mark Billingham, Belinda Bauer, John Dougherty, Chris Patten, John Bercow, Craig Brown, Andrew Adonis, Keri Davies, Timothy Bentinck, Jane Wenham-Jones, Blanche Girouard, Griselda Heppel, Mark Lawson, MG Leonard, Frances Welch, Emma Byrne, Castle Theatre Company in performance.
(2017) Roger McGough, Raymond Tallis, Anthony Seldon, Peter James,
Below is a small selection of the drawings and exhibitions Gino has presented in the Vinson Building, during his time with the festival.
Gino released his publication "The Waste Land - A Collapsing World" in 2022 an oversized artists book celebrating the centenary of TS Eliot's poem the Waste Land.
A visual Diary of the Festival containing a selection of drawings by Gino was published in November 2020 to recognise the festivals enormous acheivements before its temporary closure due to the Covid pandemic.
Castle Theatre Company, Old Mill House, Maids Moreton
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Castle Theatre Company, Love's Labour's Lost, Old Mill HouseMaids Moreton
Exhibitions and Collaborative Events presented at Buckingham Literary
Festival Festival Artist
To celebrate the story of The Buckingham Literary Festival and the wonderful authors who have come over the years Gino has been visually documenting the festival. This year an exhibition of the drawings and paintings he made will be shown in an exhibition "A Visual Diary" in The Vinson Building, University of Buckingham between 16th and 18th June
To celebrate his residency at Buckingham Parish Church. In collaboration with The Buckingham Literary Festival, Gino's installation
"Resurrection"
is exhibited alongside
"A Visual Diary" in the Vinson Building. The installation creates a further conversation and collaboration with Gino's exhibition of paintings "The Thunder Speaks" being shown in the Chancel of Buckingham Parish Church, St Peter and St Paul, Buckingham, June 15th - 30th June.
"A Visual Diary"
Gino Ballantyne
The Buckingham Literary Festival
The Vinson Building
University of Buckingham
16th - 18th June
2023 Buckingham Literary Festival
16th-18th June
presents
in collaboration with
Buckingham Parish Church
"Resurrection"
an installation
in conversation with
the exhibition
"The Thunder Speaks"
16th - 30th June
The Chancel
St Peter and St Paul
Buckingham Parish Church
The Thunder Speaks
Listen to the
thunder speak and the moment of Christ's expiration and renewal.
Publication of The Waste Land - A Collapsing World 2022
The Waste Land - A Collapsing World
Faber celebrates the centenary of The Waste Land by T. S. Eliot. Originally published in 1922, T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land was the most revolutionary poem of its time, offering a devastating vision of modern civilisation. To mark the centenary in 2022, Faber invites artistic responses. To mark the occasion artist Gino Ballantyne has produced a selection of events, exhibitions and two publications of Eliot’s poem creating a dialogue between Eliot’s world in 1922 and Gino’s world today.
A digital book published at The Buckingham Literary Festival 2022. The digital book serves as both an introduction and translator to Gino's one-of-a-kind illustrated artist’s book subsequently released on the same date as TS Eliot's book edition by Boni and Liveright published in December 1922.
This artist’s book is a network of communication combining drawn images, abstracted soundscapes and textual, binary, hexadecimal languages. The Waste Land and the Collapsing World by Gino seek the universal meaning of life, in a fragmented world where time and civilisation are collapsible.
During the festival Gino installed an interactive exhibition in The Vinson Building at Buckingham University, June 2022. Gino created an interactive Binary Wall in collaboration with the School of Computing led by Professor Harin Sellahewa, Dean of Computing at Buckingham University. ‘A powerful visual response to Eliot’s poem, Gino explores a collapsing world where our habits and notions of identity, reality and truth symbolise our disconnect with civilisation, the natural world and human consciousness.’ Vivienne Wordley.
