Artisan Connect 2024

Delta Community Center Inc. is committed to empowering marginalized artists from India by raising global awareness of their unique craftsmanship and facilitating direct access to broader markets.

These exquisitely crafted clay dolls are dried in the sun and hand painted. The figures are rounded, painted with vibrant colours and coated with Gurjan (balsam) oil to enhance their lustre.


These dolls bring you a beautiful flavour of some of the master craftsmen of rural Bengal. In his lifetime, legendary artisan Manmatha Das created more than 105 Mojilpur doll moulds, including several divine figures. His nephew Panchugopal Das would even craft large Durga idols in his inimitable style. Unfortunately, with the demise of such master craftsmen as Manmatha and Panchugopal, this unique art form is almost on the verge of extinction.



Today, these beautiful clay dolls are manufactured single-handedly by Manmatha’s grandson Sambhu Das. The ancestors of the Das family had migrated to West Bengal from Jessore (a district in south-west Bangladesh) several decades ago. Shambhu is currently the only artist in Bengal who still makes these beautiful dolls by hand, and is struggling to keep this beautiful art from going extinct.