Global Voices, Family Portrait in Black and White, Video Extra, ITVS

Airing October 14, 2012 on WORLD TV In this companion piece to the Global Voices documentary, Family Portrait in Black and White, filmmaker Julia Ivanova reflects on what drew her to her subjects and on the emotional connection she made with them. About the Film Olga Nenya has 27 children. Four of them, now adults, are her biological children; the other 23 are adopted or foster children. Of those 23, 16 are biracial. She calls them my chocolates, and is raising them to be patriotic Ukrainians. Some residents of Sumy, Ukraine, consider Olga a saint, but many believe she is simply crazy. An inheritance from the Soviet era, a stigma persists here against interracial relationships, and against children born as the result of romantic encounters between Ukrainian girls and exchange students from Africa. For more than a decade, Olga has been picking up the black babies left in Ukrainian orphanages and raising th