A graduate of the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera, the Milan designer Luisa Spinatelli created her first set design in 1965 for the ballet »Francesca da Rimini« at La Scala. During her time as assistant to Ezio Frigerio, the collaboration with Giorgio Strehler was a major inspiration for her subsequent career. In the field of ballet she worked repeatedly on productions by Carla Fracci and Beppe Menegatti. In 1985, her intensive and comprehensive cooperation with Roland Petit began. Amongst many other productions Luisa Spinatelli designed the costumes for his ballet »Die Fledermaus«, which was also adopted into the Wiener Staatsoper repertoire in 2009. Her set and costume designs for ballet and opera also include works for the Berlin State Opera, the Paris Opera, the Royal Ballet London, La Scala and Teatro dell’Opera di Roma.
Several times during her career Luisa Spinatelli has worked on the ballet »Swan Lake«. For Rudolf Nureyev’s legendary Vienna State Ballet production she created a new set and costume design in 2014. For her design for Patrice Bart’s »Swan Lake« production she was nominated for the Prix Benois in 1999. In addition, Luisa Spinatelli was awarded the Premio Positano Léonide Massine (1989), the Premio Quadrivio (1990), the Premio Grosso Lodi (1992) and the Akiko Tachibana Prize Tokyo (2005). At the Wiener Staatsballett she was most recently the stage designer for »Le Corsaire« (2016) and »Sylvia« (2018), both choreographed by Manuel Legris.