SoMa's Cartoon Art Museum will soon be kicked to the curb as another victim of the San Francisco real estate market.
On Friday the 30-year old museum announced they would be closing the doors on their location at 655 Mission Street after receiving a notice to vacate and seeking a new home. "This is just another challenge in the life of the Cartoon Art Museum," said the museum's Executive Director Summerlea Kashar in the announcement. "And given San Francisco's current commercial real estate market, it's not very surprising."
The doors will remain open until June 28 for "the only museum in the western United States dedicated to promoting a greater appreciation of cartoons, comics, animation, and illustration" before they'll have to put their enormous collection in temporary storage. As soon as that date sounds, the museum says this change was imminent and that they had been planning on relocation for "several months."
Highlights of the collection, according to the San Francisco Chronicle, include original Peanuts strips donated by Charles M. Schulz and a watercolor by Krazy Kat cartoonist George Herriman.
Although the temporary closure is just two months away, the museum will continue to bring unique programs and exhibits until June 28. The Mission Street gallery will host the Queer Comics Expo, an exhibit of Star Wars art by Jeffrey Brown, and the museum will also participate in the inaugural San Francisco Comics Festival.
Although SoMa's real estate market is tough, Kashar says she'd like the museum to stay in the neighborhood. To help out, click here to find out how you can join or support the museum.