Belfast-born film-maker Kathryn Ferguson can turn her hand to the romantic, the languid and the grave. Her back catalogue contains fashion films full of streaming sunshine, sweet and naive music videos, and documentaries exploring the commodification of the Virgin Mary in Catholic Ireland, all characterised by constantly shifting tones and aesthetics.

What her films also have in common is a director willing to explore each subject she encounters – whether she is commissioned by a fashion brand or just happens upon a topic that compels her to make a piece of art about it – with intelligence and openness.

Those same qualities are there in person too when I visit her at the light-filled Hackney apartment in which she lives and works. Engaging her on any subject is easy, as she is genuinely interested in the world and she talks at length in her still-strong Northern Irish accent (she has lived in London since 2000) on fashion and feminism, on art and the new best place to eat in east London.

Ferguson didn’t always want to work in film – her first love was fashion – but explains that when studying for a fashion communications BA at Central Saint Martins, she found herself drawn to the medium. ‘For my final project I made a magazine and a film, and everyone was looking at my film instead of my magazine. Tutors commented on it.’ she says.

‘That was an interesting moment. But it took two years after graduating to start pursuing film properly.’

She worked as stylist – ‘I was pretty rubbish at that, it wasn’t a career highlight,’ she admits – before finding a way of combining the two disciplines she was most interested in. ‘I think a lot of women are picking up the camera for the first time and exploring their ideas through fashion film,’ she says of the burgeoning genre. ‘And fashion films are mostly for women consumers so it makes a lot of sense to have a woman behind the camera as well.’

‘My peers and I are very, very aware of what we’re putting out there with our films,’ she continues. ‘We have a responsibility – with female body image and representation. That’s very important to me. There are some fashion films made by men and you’d be amazed by the shots, the boobs and the bums. You’re thinking, ‘Who is your audience?’ You’re not going to have a group of page three-reading guys saying, ‘Ooh I’m going to watch a fashion film now.’ It’s women who watch so you need to be very conscious of what they want to see. The male gaze doesn’t really work in fashion film.’

Since completing a two-year MA in film at the Royal College of Art, Ferguson herself has gone on to explore genres beyond fashion. ‘The work I made pre-RCA is very different to post-RCA,’ she says. ‘Pre-RCA it had been completely aesthetically driven and when I got to the RCA, the tutors said, ‘Come on you really need to really start thinking about narrative.’’

She hopes to make a feature-length documentary next, and has already pinpointed a subject: the Ulster Suffragettes. ‘I’m fascinated by that,’ she says. ‘When the story of Northern Ireland is told, you hear about the men but I’m very interested about women in conflict.’

Don’t expect a fly-on-the-wall piece though: ‘I want it to have a really high aesthetic; I want to approach documentary in a more creative way,’ says Ferguson, an artist who is ever diverse, always interested and consistently finding beauty – wherever that may be.