Directory Profile

Mimi Gramatky

Production Designer/Art Director/VFX/Executive/Pioneer

As a Bush Fellow at the University of Minnesota, I was the first woman to work in the scene shop at the Guthrie Theatre. In Hollywood, I was the first woman credited as VFX Camera Operator (Damnation Alley), as the VFX Producer (Meteor), and as the VFX Vice President, Cinema Research Corporation (Superman 1 & 2, Altered States, Star Trek The Wrath of Kahn, the original Tron, et.al.). My first art director credit: Miami Vice. First series production design credit: Mr. & Mrs. Smith. And, alas the only female art director on LOST (remember the bamboo catamaran?). I earned Emmy and ADG Award nominations for An Inconvenient Woman and 10,000 Days.  I served as a Governor of the TV Academy, co-chairing the Emmy Ball Committee during 9/11 when the Awards were canceled twice. I’ve served on the Board of IATSE Local 800, The Art Directors Guild, for over 15 years and, again, I am the first (and sadly the only) woman to be elected President of the Union. I am the founding President of Alliance of Entertainment Designers and Artists, an independent mutual benefit corporation dedicated to increasing public awareness and professional excellence in the art of visual story telling. In retrospect, my primary career purpose is to advance gender equality by achieving things that I never knew women couldn’t do. Awards were less important. I’ve been happily married to composer/arranger/orchestrator/pianist Geoff Stradling for nearly 40 years.