Can anyone identify this image for me?

[sfa]

St. Wilgefortis. That's my final answer.

The motifs are reminiscent of traditional icons, but the drawing is far too modern to actually *be* an icon. But it could be from a children's Lives of the Saints, although they don't often stray far beyond Francis and Paul and Elizabeth Seton, so I'm not really serious about the Wilgefortis thing. But it would be funny to tell people that's who it is.

Sarah

[Biciclista]

St Wilgefortis. hm.. why not?

[Trek420]

St. Wilgefortis. That's my final answer.

Do you want to phone a friend?

[malkin]

Wilgefortis is a good explanation for the sadness around the eyes and the...uh...features around the mouth.

The vibe from the leaf hair isn't exactly Christian, though.

[channlluv]

I agree that she looks like a children's book illustration. Lots of authors and illustrators make their own promotional materials for book signings. I'm guessing this was part of a book signing done in the area.

Roxy

[Tuckervill]

Tarot cards! That's what I was trying to think of earlier. She looks like art from a tarot card, although I couldn't identify which.

Karen

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

The design is obviously an illustration snippet from something.
After taking a peek at some of the 1" button pins offered on Etsy.com, I've come to realize that there is a whole fad consisting of people with button-making machines creating little buttons from just about any random graphic image. There are literally thousands of them!
Here are some random examples:
http://www.etsy.com/search_results.p...n=&max=&page=3

I was not aware of how many people now have button-making capabilities. In the 60's and 70's, when I was a 'youngster' and wore all kinds of anti-war and groovy button pins, buttons were something only 'official' businesses had the ability to manufacture.
So, times have changed and I know think it would be almost impossible to track down where the image came from. The image is probably just a result of someone's fun moment with their button machine, and likely does not have a 'profound' message like I had thought at first.

But I do appreciate all the good suggestions as to it's origin- it may well remain an enigma. I'll keep wearing it and maybe one day someone will see it and say "hey, that's ____!"

[malkin]

I have a button machine!