Khrzhanovsky used the story of Soviet physicist Lev Landau – whose nickname also provided the project’s title, DAU – as the basis for his fictional world.
The installation in Berlin will also feature performances and live interventions by artists including Brian Eno and Robert del Naja of Massive Attack.
People fell in and out of love, conceived 14 children, formed friendships and made enemies, according to executive producer Martine d’Anglejan-Chatillon.
In an art project that has been compared to The Truman Show, Big Brother and the Charlie Kaufman film Synecdoche, New York, a Russian artist has paid 400 people to live for three years in a fictional but functioning Stalin-era research institute.