Dover Street Market Paris has unveiled a new photography installation by British-Hungarian artist Yulia Mahr named The Church of Our Becoming, which is displayed on pillars outside the Paris store.

Inspired by the history and lasting impact of Greek statuary, The Church of Our Becoming seeks to reimagine ideals of the human form. In particular, the project moves beyond the binary of idealised male forms and passive female forms, and explores a full spectrum of gender identity. In Mahr’s words, the project “advocates for an inclusive and plural model of personhood beyond any narrow categories”.

Key to this body of work is Mahr’s desire to uncover a deeper perspective of the human experience. To do so, she utilises the incredible technology of thermal cameras, which detect thermal radiation and body heat within a frame.

Mahr first came across the medium 15 years ago. “I’d specialised in issues of representation in academia and I became fascinated by this fundamentally dehumanising technology, used most often then by military at border crossings, and how one could subvert its use to create something of compassion and beauty instead,” she tells CR.

The artist felt such technical imagery was fitting for a project aimed at looking beyond the exterior of the human form. She explains: “I’m driven, in almost anything I do, to explore our commonality and my belief in plurality – and since the camera penetrates surface superficialities, it’s the perfect instrument to explore this.”

Consisting of 13 portraits, each standing up to three and a half metres tall on pillars within Dover Street Market’s courtyard, these striking figures are the result of Mahr spending many hours in her studio, photographing her subjects. “There’s a shutter, a choice of two fixed lenses with the tiniest focus range, and a shutter mechanism that takes about 15-20 seconds,” she notes. “That means, unless you are intentionally looking for blur, those being photographed have to stand very still and hold a pose.”

Interestingly, the necessary stillness of the subjects in a sense reflects the rigidity of the sculptures that Mahr was initially inspired by for this project. For a brief period, their exposed forms are rendered motionless, like Greek statues of old, though the thermal imaging, as opposed to the marble used by sculptors, depicts their exterior and beyond. What our eyes are drawn to instead is their energy.

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The presentation coincides with a perfume collaboration between iconic fashion label Comme des Garçons (which, like DSM, is owned by Rei Kawakubo) and Mahr’s partner, the composer and pianist Max Richter. The newly released fragrance is inspired by Richter’s music practice – featuring notes evoking materials such as magnetic tape and the cedar wood of a piano soundboard – and incorporates another of Mahr’s images into the minimal packaging design by Zak Group.

She decided to remove the image, showing hands grazing one another, from the DSM installation but kept it for the perfume collaboration because of its “poetic dreaminess”, she explains. “I live in that world. It’s so much better than the real world. And I liked the parallels with the idea of scent and its ability to transport you into memory.”

The Church of Our Becoming is on show at Dover Street Market Paris until August 24; doverstreetmarketparis.com