In the following article, director of photography Kim Derko details her experience collaborating with John Greyson on The Law of Enclosures, shooting in Winnipeg, and working with some pretty ugly furniture.
John Greyson and I knew each other from the arts community, and I think that’s really the connector when we work together. He asked me to be the cinematographer on some of his short films years before either he had directed or I had shot a feature. (Of course, he went on to make Lilies and other features.) I hooked up with him again a few years later to make Uncut, a dance film shot at the Banff Centre for the Arts. The low-budget feature originated on video and transferred to film. Then he pulled me into The Law of Enclosures.
I knew some of John’s work from before he moved into film, when he made political video art. We have a kind of communication shorthand we can use because of similar art school training in articulating aesthetic ideas. But don’t get the idea it was all artsy dialogue, berets and double-tall lattes when it came to creating a style for The Law of Enclosures.