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Mike Mills

A subcultural Renaissance man accomplished in street art, graphic design, music video, commercial direction and filmmaking, Mike Mills enjoyed a quiet rise to prominence among cinephiles in the early 2000s for his movies "Thumbsucker" (2005) and "Beginners" (2010). A California native, Mills found his calling in the kinetic alternative arts scene of New York in the 1980s and '90s, becoming much-in-demand as a designer of CD art and director of music videos. He made a living as a director of TV ads and graphic designer for sundry boutique brand marketers while establishing a personal niche with pop art given to sending up corporatized America. In 2005, Mills found critical acclaim with his dryly off-the-wall coming-of-age tale "Thumbsucker," the same year he began a kind of indie royal coupling with fellow Sundance darling Miranda July. His own family became the subject matter of his deeply personal film memoirs, "Beginners" and "20th Century Women" (2016), which made him the toast of the indie realm again. An unabashed critic of American commercial culture, Mills deftly walked the fence between its most blaring advertised manifestations and a softer, subtler imprint as a storyteller.