The work of the photographer and self-taught filmmaker Jan van IJken is focused on the relationships between humans and animals, nature and microscopy. He usually works alone on long-term projects. His short film Becoming uses time-lapse photography to condense three weeks into six minutes. It shows, in full microscopic detail, the development of an Alpine newt (Ichthyosaura alpestris) in its transparent egg, from fertilization through hatching. A single cell becomes a complete, complex living organism. The microscopic images demonstrate that even a simple cell is teeming with activity and looks like a nebula in the Milky Way. *1965, lives and works in the Netherlands