Recap: Launch event on November 27, 2025, in cooperation with the New Design University St. Pölten

Photo: © eSeL.at - Lorenz Seidler

TRUSTING NATURE AND SHAPING PROSPERITY TOGETHER

From today's perspective, regeneration is the greatest creative mission of our century. This applies to all generations, but especially to younger generations. Students at art colleges and other universities face a particular challenge here, because for today's 20-year-olds, it is quite realistic that they will still be alive in 2100 due to rising life expectancy. How can they contribute to shaping the future? Given the pace of powerful technologies such as AI and the enormous dimensions of the ecological crises, we cannot even imagine what the world will be like in 2040, let alone in 75 years.

One thing is certain, however: anyone who fails to ensure lasting prosperity in liberal democracies is politically doomed. The high art of politics, economics, and society will consist of placing prosperity on a future-proof footing. After all, prosperity can only be maintained in the coming decades if it does not come at the expense of our natural resources, but respects nature and is based on regeneration. This requires a strong regenerative mindset. Together with a regenerative market economy, it forms the basis of a forward-looking agenda for 2040 and far beyond.

© eSeL.at - Lorenz Seidler

Against this background, the ReGenerativa future platform and the New Design University (NDU) in St. Pölten are seeking to collaborate on the key future topic of shaping regenerative prosperity. The NDU is an ideal partner for this complex undertaking: it is a private university that offers innovative bachelor's and master's degree programs as well as university courses in the fields of business administration, event management, interior architecture, graphic design, and design & crafts, training creative minds who are willing to think outside the box and engage with the future already today.

The launch event on the topic of shaping regenerative prosperity, organized as a collaboration, took place on November 27, 2025, at the NDU in the form of a Regenerative Futures Lab. In a series of keynote speeches and discussions, artists and cultural professionals joined forces with scientists, entrepreneurs, and students to develop concrete design and innovation approaches for regenerative prosperity and a regenerative market economy as content contributions for a future Regeneration 2040 Action Plan. An additional goal of the collaboration is to provide impetus for further discussion of regeneration at the university level (public and private institutions) and to design model processes for this purpose.

Keynote speech by Harald Gründl © eSeL.at - Lorenz Seidler

We would like to thank Rector Christoph Wecht and his team for the wonderful cooperation, as well as all participants for their enthusiastic involvement and the audience, especially the students, for their exciting questions. We look forward to continuing and deepening the collaboration in 2026.

Here is a review of the program:

 

Welcome:

Christoph Wecht, Rector of NDU
Christoph Thun-Hohenstein, Artistic Director of ReGenerativa
Martin Grüneis, Deputy Head of Department, Department of Art and Culture at the Office of the State Government of Lower Austria

 

Keynote speech and Q&A: Regenerative design for regenerative prosperity

Harald Gründl, designer (EOOS) and design researcher (IDRV), Head of the Regenerative Design Lab at the Institute of Design, University of Applied Arts Vienna

 

Voices of the NDU: Perspectives and expectations on shaping regenerative prosperity

Barbara Eichhorn
Stefan Moritsch
Florian Sammer
Christine Schwaiger
Manuel Weilguny

 

Keynote discussion: Human-machine cooperation for regenerative prosperity

Martin Düchs (NDU) in conversation with
Judith Fegerl, artist and winner of a Lower Austria Culture Award 2024 (Anerkennungspreis Kultur und Regeneration)

 

Encounters between art and business: A regenerative market economy for regenerative prosperity

Clemens Kerschbaum (NDU) in conversation with
Lukas Fürst, founder of the Melk cultural quarter UNSERE TISCHLEREI
Martina Fürst, CEO of FÜRST MÖBEL
Toni Haubenberger, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Haubis GmbH
Bertram List, Design Researcher and CEO of Yuniti Innovations GmbH

 

Closing remarks

Christoph Wecht
Christoph Thun-Hohenstein