Fourteen years in the making, Ilya Khrzhanovsky’s epic and immersive cinema experiment DAU is finally ready and is premiering in Paris across three venues – the Théâtre du Châtelet, the Théâtre de la Ville and the Centre Pompidou – until 17th February 2019.

People wishing to experience the 5 hour 30 minute saga are asked to apply for a “visa” instead of buying a ticket and must undergo a psychometric test to assess their suitability for immersion in the project.

Throughout the course of its long production the director has given a very limited number of interviews and allowed hardly any media access to the film set. Panos photographer Sergey Maximishin, working with GQ Magazine, visited the set in eastern Ukraine in 2010, leaving behind all the trappings of modernity and delving into a maddening world of deception and make-belief.

Click on the image below to see the full set from inside the Making of DAU.