Back when she was about six years old, Kim’s father bought her some Wonder Woman and Captain America comics as a lure to get her interested in figure drawing. She has loved comics ever since, and has a jam-packed storage unit to prove it. She is a writer, art historian, independent curator, and fine artist based in the San Francisco Bay area, living in a seaside house that many of her friends laughingly refer to as a “library with action figures.”

Since earning an MA in art history from San Francisco State University, her writing has focused primarily on contemporary works on paper, the intersection of the arts & popular culture, art and the law, and graphics used by the labor movement, such as union labels. She is the editor of the Eisner Award-nominated anthology Comic Art in Museums (UPM, 2020). Under Neurotic Raven she authored and published the exhibition catalogs Dual Views: Labor Landmarks of San Francisco and On Reflection: the Art of Margaret Harrison. She has contributed to several academic books including The Cambridge Companion to Comics; The Comics of R. Crumb: Underground in the Art Museum and the Routledge Handbook of the Secret Origins of Comics Studies, journals such as Places Journal and the International Journal of Comic Art, Extra Inks, and other publications. She was the curator of Women in Comics: Looking Forward and Back (with Trina Robbins, Society of Illustrators, NY), Women in Comics (Palazzo Merulana, Rome and Foqus Court of Art, Napoli), and Colleen Doran Illustrates Neil Gaiman (Society of Illustrators, NY & San Diego Comic-Con Museum). Kim was a 2022 Judge for the Eisner Awards.

Prior to her art history career, Kim was the creative director for several tech companies during the first dotcom wave, production coordinator for rock tour merchandiser Winterland Productions, the owner of a very small record label, chapter president of the SF chapter of the Recording Academy (Grammys), assistant to a high society floral designer, and a scenic artist for film, TV & theatre in Los Angeles.

Kim's "Past Lives"

Kim has had many experiences that inform her art and writing. She grew up in Manistee, Michigan, a small, predominately blue-collar town on Lake Michigan surrounded by sand dunes & national forests. Although it occupied a beautiful natural setting, in the 1960's Manistee was also a center of industry for the region. Along with the steel mills, salt manufacturing plants, garment factories, and pulp paper processors, the town also had a very active civic theatre scene centered around the historic Ramsdell Theatre. By the time Kim moved to Los Angeles in 1979 she'd done nearly 50 plays & musicals as a scenic artist, designer & stage manager. She went to work as a scenic artist in LA and has managed to work in the arts & design in one way or another ever since [click the images below to see a slideshow with captions]. These images reflect Kim’s varied careers, early shows, and volunteer work. She has lived in the San Francisco Bay Area since 1986.

Academic Presentations

Kim has presented her papers & research at the San Jose Museum of Art; San Diego Comic-Con; WonderCon; AFL-CIO national convention; Transatlantic Tuesdays (United States Diplomatic Mission in Italy, Rome); Comic Studies Society Convention (CSS); College Arts Association national convention (CAA), MoCCA Arts Festival, Popular Culture Association national convention (PCA/ACA); Society of Illustrators (NY); CXC Columbus (OSU), NEXTCOMIC Symposium (Austria), SouthWest PCA; San Diego Comics Fest; International Society for the Study of Medievalism; Laborfest (SFSU); Labor Archives & Research Center; San Diego State University, Fan Expo SF, San Francisco State University, and others. 

Archival Research

The treasure hunt of primary source research is one of the joys of the type of historical writing I do. Here I am at the AIGA archives uncovering details about the important 1942 exhibit The Comic Strip: Its Ancient and Honorable Linage and Present Significance, organized for the AIGA by Jessie Gillespie Willing, a female magazine illustrator. Some historians might recognize this show from a lengthy essay written about it by M.C. Gaines for Print Magazine.

Articles Featuring Kim

Apple censorship of Underground Classics app: “Sex! Nudity! Comix! iPhone App... Censored!” Michael Dooley. Print (on-line) 8/3/11 | The Beat “Apple censors underground comics classics” Heidi McDonald 8/9/11. | “An Uncensored Look at Banned Comics” Michael Dooley Print Magazine. Vol 68, #1 (February 2014) | CBR “Apple insists on edits to Underground Classics app” | Deep Focus Movie Reviews for the Internet “Apple, the iPhone, and the Forbidden Fruit of Adult Comics” | IcV2 “Underground Comix Censored for iPhone.”

General articles and interviews: “Comic Art Curator, author excited about Italian show, Pacifica Tribune 6/20/21, “Class Notes: Kim A. Munson” (listing) “Women in Comics”/”Comic Art in Museums,” San Francisco State Magazine, Fall/Winter 2021 & Spring/Summer 2021. Rob Salkowitz, “Splashing Ink on Museum Walls: How Comic Art Is Conquering Galleries, Museums, and Public Spaces.” Full Bleed: The Comics and Culture Quarterly 2. San Diego, CA: IDW, 2018. 138-46, “Beyond the Graphic Novel: Gender-Bending Superhero Feminism” Michael Dooley IMPRINT 1/8/2016 | “Art in Comics” in Marg, Magazine of the Arts, Dec 1, 2014 | Book review: Margaret Harrison. John A Lent in the International Journal of Comic Art, Spring 2016 | “The Scholars Corner: Kim Munson” Art Cloos. Scoop/PreviewsWorld (on-line) 3/18/16.

The Neurotic Ravens

Neurotic Raven is named after the mated pairs of ravens who have visited our seaside balcony every morning for breakfast and a chat. They peer in our door, watching us and discussing the actions of "those odd humans" with clicks, knocks and squawks, as curious about us as we were about them. Intelligent & obsessed with red-tailed hawks, peanuts & shiny things, I imagine them being as neurotic as any writer/artist can be.

Header image: Palazzo Merulana visitors Monica Catacano and Barbara Sbrocca discuss cover art by Afua Richardson (also work by Summer Pierre and Ann Telnaes).