Candace Hicks, associate professor of art in the School of Art at Stephen F. Austin State University, has captivated our attention with some of her unique textile art series.

Notes for String Theory is a series of the very familiar composition book pages we all know from gradeschool - a symbol of learning and processing thoughts.

“These hand-embroidered pages confront the existential possibilities of the blank page,” Hicks explains. “The size, format and color palette of notebook paper are familiar and warped at the same time. From across the room, they appear as flat, linear designs, but upon closer inspection reveal themselves to be delicately textured.”

The warped lines evoke a sense of wonder, of what can be if we alter the process. There is chaos yet beauty in the linear movement on the altered pages - much in the same way we face the unexpected possibilities of daily life.

Similarly, the series "Love Note to Linear Perspective" takes the same concepts and applies them to paper - the material guiding the process, and therefore the end result - cut pieces exploding out and exploring time and space in it's many forms.

Her work in the series "Common Threads" brings our attention back to the words on a page in 146 intricately hand-embroidered books containing illustrations and a plethora of texts "documenting her life in a universe of literary and pop-cultural coincidences".

There's always something compelling about the time it takes to hand stitch a work of art - it's a delicate, sometimes painstaking process wracked with mistakes, learning, and improvement - stitches ripped and re-sewn as past choices are no longer quite right for this work; an art of microcosm macrocosm.

In these works, Candace embraces thoughts of the universe, the unknown, life as we know it, connection, and possibility and puts her stitch in time.

To view more of Candace's work, check out her instagram!