#TRANSFORMINGTOMORROW: MAKE A DIFFERENCE WITH US.

IT:U — the Interdisciplinary Transformation University in Linz, Austria offers up to two Tenure-track and Tenured Professorships at the Intersection of Art, Design, Digital Technology & Society

Shape the future with us as a

How to transform art, science and society and what role will digital technologies play in this transformation? We are looking for applicants who want to share and further develop their own unique perspective upon this question by drawing from their own practice and research along the Krebs Circle of art, design, science, and engineering.

We welcome applicants from a wide range of academic or practice-based backgrounds. Importantly, we aim to strengthen the diversity of positionalities from which transformation of art, science and society is being conducted to ensure a perspective that recognizes the plurality of society. As such, we particularly encourage people to apply that bring typically under-represented backgrounds such as in terms of gender, (dis)abilty or socio–cultural backgrounds to the table.

WE ARE LOOKING FOR YOU  

We welcome outstanding applicants with research and teaching experience who have demonstrated impact in their field and its intersection to other disciplines. The successful candidates will join a dynamic academic environment to lead research, foster collaboration, and contribute to teaching in fields critical to the future of digital transformation.   

We are looking for candidates that are particularly interested in one or more of the questions below and want to further develop them with us at IT:U:

• Designing Sensual AI – How will a wide variety of complex human experiences (from sensory to affective perception) be represented in and transformed by future AI systems? Such experiences include both, experiences at any given moment as well as building on deeply unique recollections of the past and visions of the future. How will we create AI that is designed to engage with or simulate sensory experience, as well as emotions or feelings? And what if we do – and what if we don’t. We are particularly interested in the development of multi-sensory or hyper-sensory AI, ranging from work on novel sensing technologies to speculative design.  
• More-than-human Transformation – How will we be able to explore more-than-human experiences through digital systems? How could we develop systems that understand, integrate and transcend human capacities and include non-human organisms, at a wide range of scale – from fungi, plants and animals to whole ecosystems or even at the planetary scale. We are particularly interested in work that decenters the human and finds new ways to negotiate a future society that is sustainable for truly all beings.
• Speculative Innovation – How will we explore (and design) potential futures, alternative realities and new solutions that today seem far-fetched when we employ the new digital tools that AI research pushes online by the minute? How will the design process be redrawn, creativity constructed, and the current canon of design methods and strategies (including design thinking, art thinking, participatory design) be reshaped? We are particularly interested in applicants that have both a research and practice record with a healthy appetite to reshape the profession.
• Next Narratives, Next Shapes – How will AI and emerging technologies reshape how we design in physical and virtual spaces, while transforming the way we create and experience narratives? How can computational technologies help us craft stories that go beyond immersion to become fully interactive, responding dynamically to human presence and movement? What new forms and possibilities arise when kinetic design merges with storytelling, enabling environments and objects to adapt and come alive through motion and interaction? We are particularly intrigued by the potential of AI, XR, robotics, spatial design, and kinetic systems to redefine storytelling and spatial experiences, forging hybrid realities that push the boundaries of creativity, connection, and meaning.