Legend of Moving Mount Meru to Java
A retelling based on the Old Javanese Tantu Panggelaran, 15th century

In ancient times, Java floated freely on the ocean, constantly trembling and shifting because it had no mountain to anchor it. Bhatara Guru—the supreme divine teacher in the Javanese Hindu tradition, identified with Shiva, the Hindu god of transformation—instructed the gods to move the sacred Mount Mahameru from Jambudvipa, identified with present-day India, to Java. Vishnu, the preserver of the universe, took the form of a giant serpent to bind the mountain, while Brahma, the creator, became a giant turtle that carried it.

As the gods transported Mahameru across Java, fragments broke away and formed a chain of mountains and volcanoes. At the end of the journey, Mahameru came to rest in eastern Java, where it became Mount Semeru. Under the weight of the sacred mountain, the island was brought into balance and no longer drifted upon the ocean.

"The Bowl" is a proposed land-art installation on the island of Java, Indonesia, connecting the island’s mythological origins with its geological formation. It is imagined as a concrete shell, similar to the form of a bowl, approximately seven metres in diameter, erected on a flat landscape in close proximity to an active volcano.

The bowl acts as a device that collects falling volcanic ash. Over time, the ash, rainwater, dust and soil solidify and gradually fill the bowl, forming ground in which vegetation can grow—a small, independent living system in the form of art.

The bowl is both a container and a reference to the mythological mountain. The structure has no fixed foundations and rests unstably on its spherical surface, perhaps for years or decades, until the accumulating material fills it and brings it into balance. In this way, it resembles the trembling, free-floating island that was eventually stabilised by the mountain.

The intervention becomes a physical manifestation of Java’s unique geographical conditions, its long geological formation and its ecosystem. It captures time and place and reveals how the forces of nature, landscape and forms of life belong together and depend on one another.

Experimental plaster shell models
Analog black-and-white photograph
Approximately Ø 60 cm, 2-5 mm thick

Abstract conceptual model
Plaster and brass