Borobudur: 9th cy Mahayana Temple Weaving
21.5" x 68"      
Borobudur is a 9th-century Mahayana Buddhist temple in Magelang Regency, in Central Java, Indonesia. It is the world's largest Buddhist temple. The temple consists of nine stacked platforms, six square and three circular, topped by a central dome. It is decorated with 2,672 relief panels and 504 Buddha statues. The central dome is surrounded by 72 Buddha statues, each seated inside a perforated stupa. The temple design follows Javanese Buddhist architecture, which blends the Indonesian indigenous cult of ancestor worship and the Buddhist concept of attaining Nirvana. The monument is a shrine to the Lord Buddha and a place for Buddhist pilgrimage. The pilgrim journey begins at the base of the monument and follows a path around the monument, ascending to the top through three levels symbolic of Buddhist cosmology: Kāmadhātu (the world of desire), Rūpadhātu (the world of forms) and Arūpadhātu (the world of formlessness).
 
The pattern was made by using supplementary warp threads, which float above the red base fabric. Crafting these patterns is a painstaking process; the weaver has to plan every element of the design in advance, and insert as many as several hundred heddle sticks into the unwoven threads on the loom, to help her raise just the right warps for each pass of the weft.
Hand Woven in Indonesia