MFA in Technical Design and Production from David Geffen School of Drama at Yale University

Office: MCD 112
Phone: 801-581-5154
Email: em.bertelli@utah.edu

Em Bertelli has worked in production management, lighting, scenery, sound, and automation in theatres across the country, and she has been at the School of Dance since 2022.

She began designing lighting at the University of Rochester, where she was the first member of her college dance group to design lights for a production while also performing in it. She completed her undergraduate degree in brain and cognitive sciences and worked in sleep research before pivoting back to her interest in live arts production. After earning her MFA, her career focused particularly on outdoor repertory theatre, including production leadership roles at Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Utah Shakespeare Festival, Transcendence Theatre Company (Sonoma, CA), and Colorado Shakespeare Festival. She then became a senior designer at K2, an audiovisual consulting firm based in Boulder, CO, where she contributed audiovisual design to building and renovation projects nationwide.

Em, her husband Dante, and their doodle, Mina, lived in a self-converted Chevy van for nine months, during which she worked as a freelance lighting designer and technical draftsperson, before moving to Millcreek, UT. Outside of work, she enjoys hiking, camping, mountain biking, and generally all things outdoors.