Mako Idemitsu (1940–) is a Japanese filmmaker and video artist. After graduating from Waseda University, she moved to the United States and began making films in New York and California during the 1960s. A pioneer of experimental film and video art in Japan, she has examined women’s roles within the family, relationships between mothers and children and between husbands and wives, and the conflict between artistic work and domestic responsibilities. Her early video “What a Woman Made” depicts the restrictions women face within both the male-dominated art world and the home. In her autobiography “Howatto a Uman Meido: Aru Eizo Sakka no Jiden,” she recounts how she developed her own artistic practice while confronting the expectations attached to being a wife and mother.
