Seattle is an urban wilderness. We are surrounded by hundreds of thousands of acres of forest. Even within the city itself are enough parks blanketed with towering Douglas firs that it is still possible to step out of the concrete jungle and get lost in the deep, dark woods. The work of No Touching Ground only heightens the sense that our metropolis is primeval. He decorates barren walls with massive wheatpastes of wolves, grizzly bears, owls, and other wildlife. They are often juxtaposed with images of people, such as a striking piece in which a young man in a beanie is depicted with his head tilted back and his eyes closed, exhaling a series of hawk silhouettes, each black bird enveloping the white outline of a human at the zenith of a swan dive. Good street art forces unsuspecting viewers to contemplate their surroundings and imbues the landscape with a new sense of place. In this regard, No Touching Ground is a master of the form. KEEGAN HAMILTON notouchingground.com