The Certificate Program offers interdisciplinary studies for students whose interests lie at the intersection of creative practice and professional application. Spanning 2 or 3 semesters, depending on your prior education, professional training, or work experience, this program provides a unique opportunity to enhance your qualifications or update your design portfolio. If you already hold a degree in an artistic or creative field, you can earn a state-recognized “Certified Communication Designer” credential alongside your existing degree.

The program seamlessly integrates theory and practice through concrete project work. Students, guided by their interests and existing qualifications, develop communicative and creative solutions in areas such as “Design in Art and Culture,” “Design in Fashion and Textiles,” “Design in Law and Politics,” “Design in Society and Social Affairs,” and “Design in Economy and Business.” These projects are carried out in close cooperation with companies, institutions, and other organizations, ensuring practical applicability.

The faculty are leaders in their fields, deeply committed to scholarship, social engagement, and public intellectual work. This program is excellent preparation for postgraduate studies in the fields of Visual Arts and Design.

Projects can take various forms, including academic research, book development, film, digital projects, exhibitions, and more. This approach provides students with both in-depth expertise and valuable practical experience, equipping them for current challenges in their respective fields.

This program was developed out of the desire to integrate design into social processes to enable change. Legal and political questions are immediately evident in public dealings with social problems, language, and communication. The structures of these manifestations can be visually documented and expressed transparently. This transparency can be of elementary importance in legal and political discussions and decisions. An interdisciplinary body consisting of jurists, political scientists, philosophers, and designers challenges students on the content-related aspects of their work and provides theoretical orientation. The problems to be addressed are selected in the context of current social issues, in collaboration with human rights organizations, institutes, associations, and other relevant entities

The “Fashion and Textiles” program is characterized by an interdisciplinary environment where research, critical analysis, and ethical conduct are paired with independent aesthetic development. The innovative orientation of this area of study requires and promotes the development of students’ independent positions, enabling them to transform concepts into tangible products, experiences, and “moving images.” This results in fashion and textiles collections, as well as experimental objects and spatial orchestrations. The theoretical and practical design process is supported by renowned firms, international galleries, and archives, providing a strong network that significantly enhances the creative process.

Which structural conditions fuel discrimination, marginalization, and conflict? Which historical parameters determine our present? All forms or expressions of social events and problems essentially take effect between individuals, and consequently also between the designer and the person they are addressing. As such, self-reflection and understanding are crucial and naturally accompany the design process in this program. The goal is to integrate design wherever communication is most urgently needed, particularly in the growing reality of social inequality.

More than ever, the question of method and form is relevant to classic corporate communication. Consumers’ value-based ecological, social, and cultural requirements decisively influence their relationship with products and services. The demands on design and media are correspondingly more complex and diverse. To meet these demands, any form of creative work begins with qualitative research, as well as the program’s own “VisualResearch.” This research-based part of the design process provides key parameters for the communication assignment, forming the logical basis for both aesthetic development and media-based decisions. Cooperation partners from the business world accompany the process, providing real-life conditions that complement the research-based design approach.

The focus and goal of the “Art and Culture” program is the visual reflection on social strategies and the foundations for the emergence of commonalities between design and art, as well as their transformation in “culture.” This department poses questions that fundamentally shape our everyday life with regard to design: How can choreographic methods be translated visually? Which correlations can we translate from the written word into aesthetic form? How does design penetrate our reality? The Art and Culture department seeks to convey to students both a visual (self-)awareness and an awareness of their work’s impact on our existence. This aspiration shapes the design process and forms the basis for working with well-known and international artists and writers.