Born in southern Ukraine on the Black Sea, Illarion spent ten years of his childhood in the far east of Russia due to the political persecution of his journalist parents and returned to Ukraine in his late teens. He worked for a number of years as a news correspondent and journalist, prior to moving into television and film. Illarion is the author, screenwriter, and/or producer of over ten documentaries and films, and served as a member of the jury for the 2011 Emmy Awards. He currently serves as the creative producer of Ivory Films, an independent studio in Kyiv, of which he is a co-founder. Illarion’s first novel White Ash was published in 2018 and was immediately followed by the novella Maria, It’s Christmas. His second novel The Dance of the Simpleton was published in 2019, and a third is in progress. In 2015, Illarion served as an intelligence volunteer in the war in Eastern Ukraine.