

Ulana Suprun, Black Sea Whale
The first issue of The Black Sea Whale appeared last year, providing a platform for new Ukrainian writers and illustrators, a mission sharpened by Russia invading Ukraine in 2022.
The magazine was conceived and published by Ukrainian-American physician Ulana Suprun and her partner-in-life Marko, who moved to Kyiv from the US in 2013. The two were part of the Revolution of Dignity-Euromaidan, and trained the military in tactical medicine when Russia first invaded Ukraine in 2014. Ulana served as acting Minister of Health (2016-2019), during which we introduced universal healthcare for all Ukrainians and launched a successful a blog on public health. When she left governement, she and Marko published a book busting myths in health and medicine, which started their path to publishing.
Plans for their magazine were somewhat hijacked by Russia’s invasion; what was first and foremost a cultural project developed a more loaded meaning in the context of the invasion and war. Ulana explains more as she shares her week ahead.
What are you doing this morning?
I wake up at 5am every morning, no matter the time zone in which I find myself. This morning I awoke in GMT+5. I’m spending most of the day travelling: in cars, at airports and on airplanes. I’m returning to London from the US, where my family celebrated my father’s 90th birthday. Roadtrips are common for me, since my partner Marko and I commute between Kyiv and London.
There are still no flights in or out of Ukraine, so it takes a couple of days plus a combination of trains, planes and automobiles to travel to or from Kyiv. I have learned to work on the move, with my laptop literally on my lap and my iPad charged up to read or edit on the go. I carry a backpack, filled with a single change of clothes and mostly filled with books, MacBook, notebook and extra batteries.
Describe your work environment—what can you see from your desk/ through the window?
In Kyiv, I work from home or the office, depending on whether or not there is electricity and a network connection and if the air raid sirens are warning to take cover from Iranian Shahed drones, Russian ballistic missiles or Russian MiG airplanes and their Kalibr missiles. Our office is an open space with a conference room. We work with freelancers and artists with whom we have white-board brainstorming sessions, so the office bustles with activity despite the dangers from above.
When we don’t have the rolling metal shutters down to protect the windows from a potential blast wave, I see peacocks, ducks, chickens and pheasants through the window of the office which is on the first floor of a high-rise residential building just north of the city centre. Our neighbour is a farmer who refused to give up his land to developers and maintains his fowl as a small petting zoo.
Turns out, roosters, ducks and peacocks are indifferent to the wailing of air raid sirens and strike a welcome tune to the cacophony around us. Writers and illustrators rarely notice anymore, taking solace in their creative projects either in the office or the bomb shelter in the basement. Visitors to the office are happily envious and we share the story of the rebel-farmer, creating new partnerships through story.
Which magazine do you first remember?
Spy magazine in the 1990’s and the Canadian magazine The Walrus.

Spy magazine was satirical, funny, used cartoons and illustrations to enhance the experience of reading it. I was sad when they stopped publishing it.

I was introduced to The Walrus by Marko (he’s Canadian). The stories in the magazine are long reads, well-researched and provide a different perspective, since it is Canadian. It made me “think different” about a lot of those things I took for granted in my American-centred view.

Aside from yours, what’s your favourite magazine?
Delayed Gratification. The concept of slow journalism, where the stories are deep dives into the subject matter is refreshing and intriguing compared to the shallowness of headline news and social media. The writers and editors have the patience to wait and see the outcomes and long term effects rather than the immediate reactions, providing both analysis and reflection.
Granta is another one of my favourites, especially their fiction. The stories aren’t all about plot, they are reflections on life. We aim to emulate these principles in the stories in The Black Sea Whale.

Describe Black Sea Whale in three words…
Vision, Discovery, Innovation

…and tell us about that name!
The idea to start an English language magazine about ideas and stories from Ukraine has been with us since the 1990s when Marko registered the domain name blackseawhale.com. We wanted to create a platform for people to write about things that could be found in overlooked places, even if, they might not be real today.
Ukrainians, like the Black Sea whale, didn’t exist for most of the international community. The journal is a place for underdogs who can inspire new ideas and unconventional solutions.
What was the aim of the magazine, and how did that change when the war started?
The Black Sea Whale aims to be a platform showcasing new Ukrainian writers and illustrators, to provide the opportunity for them to share their ideas and stories with the world. Robert McKee says, “Stories are a metaphor for life.” And Ukrainians have a lot of stories to tell, to describe who we are, who we were, and who we want to be.
Marko and I started an NGO and a small publishing company in Ukraine called ArcUA and UM LLC in 2019. The online magazine was scheduled to go live in both Ukrainian and English languages at the end of February 2022, introducing the long-read stories by new Ukrainian writers.
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine meant we had to adapt; we were in Kyiv at the time, and some of our team were called up or joined the military, others evacuated to the western part of Ukraine, still others were caught under occupation. It seemed like publishing fiction and nonfiction stories from Ukraine was a fool’s errand as most of the world was telling us Ukraine wouldn’t be around in a few weeks.
Palpable fear can be paralyzing; and just when you think the end has arrived, along comes the spark of tenacity to reignite a hope and a strength that went unnoticed and unseen. That spark came in the form of 13 border guards who told the Russian warship to go fuck themselves.

The Black Sea Whale team
By the end of April 2022 the team we assembled regrouped in Kyiv and started writing. Oleksii, a historian and writer, imagined an alternative future in “Deus ex Ucraina” giving Ukrainians an idea of a world better than the one in which they found themselves. Our executive editor Viktoriia, reached out to other writers and illustrators, and we were flooded with incredible ideas and stories. It was obvious, these stories would find a reader abroad, they could enable the world to “see the unseen,” and that is how The Black Sea Whale came about.

We spent the next few months researching the market and came upon magCulture, as much a magazine store as it is a Mecca for inspiration. Jeremy’s book became a road map for our designers, opening up new ideas from the history of zines. But nothing can supplant the teaching power of making great mistakes, which we did. The first issue was printed in Ukraine (twice) and finally exported to the UK in 2024.

Yet, delays with paper and the damage done to Ukraine’s energy infrastructure has made bringing the next issues to market difficult; but, there really is nothing that can stop the telling of a good story. The kindness of strangers is as reliable as the rising sun, and we were introduced to distributors Ra & Olly who then introduced us to printers Park Communications who graciously worked with our designers to adapt The Black Sea Whale to be printed in the United Kingdom.
Today, The Black Sea Whale is written, illustrated and designed in Ukraine and printed in the United Kingdom.
What has the response to the magazine’s first two issues been?
It’s been overwhelming! What’s important for us is to highlight the writers and illustrators, and to provoke new thought and ideas in readers who may think they have nothing in common with Ukrainians. The feedback we have received has been great, with many in our audience telling us the stories resonated with them, reminding them of their own lives.
For instance, in the first issue we have a story about a museum in Kyiv called “An Albino Raven in the Museum of Soviet Values” and our copy editor told us the story reminded him of what his sister, who works at the British Museum, talks about when they discuss her job.
Together with our British partners, The Black Sea Whale is available in multiple places throughout the United Kingdom, the United States and the European Union.

Please highlight one story that sums up how the magazine works, and gives a sense of what the reader can expect.
The second issue of The Black Sea Whale reveals what’s hidden behind the curtain, unmasking hypocrisy and questioning the axioms we often adhere to without truly understanding their effects.
In his story “Mature Ukraine,” Oleksii Dubrov describes how Ukraine is breaking the cycle of abuse perpetrated by its neighbour to the north, starting with Gogol’s story about Ukrainian Cossacks being seen by the Russian monarch as lowly peasants who can sing and dance but are not worthy of having their own country, through the razing of Ukrainian cities by Russian soldiers over the centuries, burning and looting along the way. The horrific slaughter of Ukrainians in Bucha is not the exception to the rule, but is what the Russians have been doing to Ukrainians for centuries. “Great” Russian literature glorified and endorsed this vicious behaviour. Today, Ukraine is building its self esteem, finally breaking free from its abuser.
What advice would you offer someone planning to launch a magazine?
The first piece of advice I would give for them is to read your book, Jeremy, ‘The Modern Magazine’, which is what we did when we began our journey.
The Black Sea Whale was the culmination of a great deal of planning, preparation, teamwork, a few false starts (the first print run was a throw-away), time and emotional investment. It’s all worth it when you see the magazine in print, and readers are picking it up off on the shelves of bookstores and magazine shops and reading the stories of the talented writers, beautifully illustrated by local Ukrainian artists.
My last piece of advice would be to not go chasing sales or profit; if you have a quality magazine, those things will find you. If you have a labour of love, it will become your priceless pension.
What are you most looking forward to this coming week?
This week I’m looking forward to completing the registration of our business in Poland so we can publish The Black Sea Whale in the Polish language. We’re also signing the contract with our translator in Japan to move forward with the Japanese language translation of the magazine’s first issue.
Editor-in-chief Ulana Suprun
Designer Zakhar Kryvoshyya
Producer Marko Suprun
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