In this collage, the artist has combined a leaf with lime, putting a mineral element together with an object from the natural world. Beuys occasionally used leaves and pressed flowers in his early works of the 1940s and 1950s, and drawings of natural forms were included in his first exhibitions after the Second World War. This reflects an interest in the natural sciences which was lifelong. In later years, Beuys referred to the 1950s as a period of preparation, which he spent reading and making hundreds of drawings which influenced his later sculpture and 'actions'.