Konstantina was a Bulgarian-born American artist who lived and worked in Tappahannock, Virginia, until her passing in 2018.  Her last body of work, "Soul of a Knight" is the culmination of a decade of deeply personal artistic exploration. After an immersive journey through the history of female heroism, Konstantinova selected a handful of women whose stories spoke most powerfully to her heart — women unafraid to sacrifice everything for something greater than themselves, women who carried, in her words, the soul of a knight.

​

Her mixed media technique is as distinctive as the women she celebrated. Breaking from conventional boundaries, Konstantinova worked freely between figurative and nonrepresentational abstraction, often incorporating found objects and personal belongings into richly textured canvases that evolved through what she called manipulation rituals — layered, deliberate, and deeply felt. She developed her own theory of the spiritual relationship between materiality and concept, and the result is a body of work that is as intellectually compelling as it is visually stunning. Remarkably, at least half of the works in the exhibition are, in one form or another, self-portraits — making this collection not only a tribute to heroic women throughout history, but a profound statement about Konstantinova herself.

​

Beyond her art, Konstantinova left a lasting legacy as an educator at St. Margaret's School in Tappahannock and as a leader of public art projects that engaged and inspired local communities. She was also widely known as part of the collaborative artistic partnership with her husband under the collective name KonKons — though this final body of work was entirely her own.

​

​

OPENING  JUNE 27

Of This Place • A Juried Show Co-sponsored by TAG & Two Rivers Arts