Spring brings with it a fresh palette of colors that beckons artists to paint outdoors. Once upon a time, Bill and I, newly taking up oil painting, headed for a slip of a park in the countryside to set up our easels. 

An instructor had suggested our first project should be learning to simulate reality. With brand new brushes and palettes in hand, we propped canvas boards on easels and set about "creating."  We  both faced the same view. Getting the right yellow to match the sprightly dandelions was reasonably easy. Matching the lone pink dogwood taught us there's a lot more white paint in the mixture than red. The leaves on the trees, however, proved to be more of a challenge than we'd expected; we learned that nature provided a rather broad range of green hues. Even the trunks presented multiple colors, from light tans through browns to almost blacks. Behind the spring foliage and bloom, there was a vary-toned blue sky to match. 

Despite our intentness, we began to notice that we were attracting an audience. It was obvious that others strolling on that fresh warm day were intrigued by these "artists" at work. A lot of people somehow managed to wander close enough to see the possible masterpieces. 

Most quietly veered away again. Some could be seen exchanging glances that clearly indicated - perhaps "surprise" is the kindest word. A few made their reactions known in less than murmuring tones. 

The dialogue that most amused us neophyte student painters went something like this:  Critic One commented, "I don't know--I just don't understand modern art."  Critic Two replied, "I like them. That one in particular has good dimensions."  (As this took place behind us, we didn't know which of us had done so well.) 

Artist One raised an eyebrow and whispered, "Modern Art?"  Artist Two shrugged. 

We "artists" managed to hold our guffaws until the critics were out of earshot. All that attention to our "art" and what we really had was - well, you see, our efforts had been to realistically match the hues of nature - so our "pictures" were just splotch after splotch of all the colors in front of us - not the scene - all we'd made were patchwork quilts of oil paint experimentation. 

But after all, isn't "art" really in the eye of the beholder? And one of us had good dimensions.