  A homomorphism of a signed graph $(G, \sigma)$ to $(H, \pi)$ is a mapping of
vertices and edges of $G$ to (respectively) vertices and edges of $H$ such that
adjacencies, incidences and the product of signs of closed walks are preserved.
Motivated by reformulations of the $k$-coloring problem in this language, and
specially in connection with results on $3$-coloring of planar graphs, such as
Gr\"otzsch's theorem, in this work we consider bounds on maximum average degree
which are sufficient for mapping to the signed graph $(K_{2k}, \sigma_m)$
($k\geq 3$) where $\sigma_m$ assigns to edges of a perfect matching the
negative sign. For $k=3$, we show that the maximum average degree strictly less
than $\frac{14}{5}$ is sufficient and that this bound is tight. For all values
of $k\geq 4$, we find the best maximum average degree bound to be 3.
  While the homomorphisms of signed graphs is relatively new subject, through
the connection with the homomorphisms of $2$-edge-colored graphs, which are
largely studied, some earlier bounds are already given. In particular, it is
implied from Theorem 2.5 of "Borodin, O. V., Kim, S.-J., Kostochka, A. V., and
West, D. B., Homomorphisms from sparse graphs with large girth. J. Combin.
Theory Ser. B (2004)" that if $G$ is a graph of girth at least 7 and maximum
average degree $\frac{28}{11}$, then for any signature $\sigma$ the signed
graph $(G,\sigma)$ maps to $(K_6, \sigma_m)$.
  We discuss applications of our work to signed planar graphs and, among
others, we propose questions similar to Steinberg's conjecture for the class of
signed bipartite planar graphs.
