The Department of Design Film Art at Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts (HSLU) is launching two new courses in fall 2025: On the one hand, the Master’s specialization "Knowledge to Society" as part of the Master’s degree program in Art, and on the other, the Bachelor’s degree program "Transformation & Sustainability".
Master’s specialization "Knowledge to Society"
Whether in medicine, in dealing with new technologies such as AI or in coping with climate change: scientific findings shape our everyday lives and how we live together as a society. "We live in knowledge societies - but many people often lack an understanding of this," says Sabine Gebhardt Fink, Head of the Master of Arts at Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts. The new Master’s specialization "Knowledge to Society" (KNOTS for short) at HSLU aims to remedy this situation.Artistic work forms the core of the course, as Gebhardt Fink explains: "People can be reached differently through the means of art than through science communication or scientific illustration." This allows people to participate in knowledge societies who would otherwise not feel addressed. For example, students develop video and audio installations, interventions in public spaces or exhibition projects in collaboration with partner institutions and experts.
According to the head of the Master of Arts, the specialization does not primarily serve to impart knowledge, but aims to make scientific discourse tangible, understandable and negotiable in dialogue with the general public. This also involves questioning the mechanisms of knowledge production and critically examining them.
KNOTS is primarily aimed at people with an interest in scientific and technological topics as well as training in the visual arts or related fields such as film, photography, architecture, design and illustration. Internships in museums or science pavilions or in the research departments of universities and companies are an integral part of the curriculum. In addition, close collaboration with science research at the University of Lucerne is in preparation.
Bachelor Transformation and Sustainability
Aspects of transformation and sustainability are already included in numerous HSLU courses. However, the focus is always on acquiring skills in a specific subject area, be it design, business, architecture, social work or IT.This relationship is reversed in the Bachelor’s in Transformation & Sustainability. Jens Badura, head of the new course, explains: ’Here, the students’ own transformation concerns are at the beginning of the course: they bring this with them from their respective educational or professional backgrounds and use the course to systematically work out their own transformation projects and develop corresponding implementation strategies.
Students then use the potential of ways of thinking and processes from art and design as a source for shaping transformation processes. The Bachelor’s in Transformation & Sustainability is also particularly closely networked with courses offered by other HSLU departments. This allows students to draw on the economic, technical or social science expertise available there, which is important for their respective projects.
A central aspect of the curriculum is the networking of students with stakeholders from administration, business or NGOs - the institutions whose transformation they will lead after graduation. ’This puts graduates in the best position to initiate, support and reflect on transformation processes towards sustainable development as ’changemakers’,’ says Jens Badura.
