Symbolic Icon on a small scale

Last week I had fun playing in my studio and came up with this piece. I really struggled in Anahata's icon class but I think some of it must have sunk in since it really comes across in this piece, which isn't my usual style at all. I really enjoyed stepping outside my usual colors and techniques to use more pen and fewer collage elements to fill in the space. Admittedly, it helped to work on a much scale of 5x7 than 11x14 that we used in class. When you get used to working on the 1 1/2 x 2 scale, 5x7 seems huge.

Just in case you can't read the text it says "She believed in herself, even when she had to dance in her panties." Uhm, clearly the pic spoke to me and had a story to tell! Really, I have no defense here but I still love it and stand by it being appropriate to the piece. Plus, it was really late at night when I worked on it. :)

Tomorrow's Friday so I'm really going to run wild, I might stay up until midnight tomorrow!