Ukrainian illustrator designs Guardian Weekly cover honoring Chornobyl’s 40th anniversary

Ukrainian illustrator Masha Foya created the cover for the latest issue of Guardian Weekly, dedicated to the 40th anniversary of the Chornobyl nuclear disaster.

In its May 1, 2026 edition, the British Guardian Weekly spotlighted Chornobyl on the cover, alongside a special report examining the current state of the damaged shelter over the fourth reactor. The cover’s art direction was led by Andrew Stokes.

“Stokes shared some information from the article and explained what themes should be featured on the cover,” Foya said, revealing that she had received the offer to create the illustration directly from the Guardian’s art director. “I had three ideas for the cover. The main themes incorporated into the sketches were the importance of protecting the NPP [Nuclear Power Plant], the revival of nature in the exclusion zone, and the current threat posed by Russian drone attacks. The article discusses a scenario where a drone strikes the NPP in 2025. I wanted to convey the atmosphere of protection through human hands and the reality of the current threat, so the color palette is close to realistic,” said Foya.

According to Foya, projects like this carry deeper meaning than a typical international commission. It entails a great sense of responsibility for how the Ukrainian experience will be interpreted visually abroad.

In the editorial preview of the Guardian Weekly issue, journalist and editor of Guardian Weekly Graham Snowdon writes that Foya’s visual concept is built on the contrast between the beauty of spring and the disaster that occurred in April 1986. It is this dissonance that the illustrator has made the basis of the cover: greenery and light gradually give way to an ominous sky, and the composition itself refers not only to the past but also to current fears surrounding the Chornobyl NPP.

RELATED: How Ukrainian illustrators depict common pain after the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant explosion

“Since childhood, the story of Chornobyl has always made me feel a strange dissonance – such a tragedy occurring on a beautiful spring day in April,” said Foya on the thought process behind her design, in which seasonal greens fade away into ominous skies.

Masha Foya is a Kyiv-based illustrator. Foya has collaborated with The Guardian Weekly, The New York Times, Scientific American, Die Zeit, and Adobe. Her Ukrainian clients include, among others, the Old Lion Publishing House, Vivat, Vydavnytstvo, Nash Format, and others.

As previously reported, in 2022, The Washington Post published a comic about the war by Ukrainian illustrator Yulia Vus. In addition, The Globe and Mail published a comic about the war by Jenya Polosina and Anna Ivanenko. The famous British newspaper The Economist has published a series of illustrations by Ukrainian artist Maria Kinovych about the way life in Ukraine has changed after the start of Russian shelling of critical infrastructure.

RELATED: S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 features soundtracks inspired by Vasyl Stus’ poetry

Images: Masha Foya

Copy editing: Joy Tataryn