By Yeo Ye-rim
Kim In-yeong, 27, graduated college with an art degree last year. She is still unemployed and is working part-time at a cafe, earning 1.2 million won ($1,000) a month.
Kim is planning to go abroad soon with a working holiday visa and earn a new college degree.
“I have always dreamt of becoming an artist,” Kim said, according to Newsis. “But I have no time for art when I’m working all day, earning slightly over a million won a month.”
Living in Korea as an artist is not easy. According to a report by Seoul Foundation for Arts and Culture on 430 artists, 52 percent of the respondents earned less than one million won each month. Five percent earned none at all.
About a quarter of the respondents answered that earnings through artistic activities were not enough to support their monthly livings. About half of them chose part-time jobs as the most convenient way to earn extra income. About 30 percent of them relied on economic support by their parents and others loaned on debt.
Further, a similar report by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism indicated that, among the artists who also carry out non-artistic activities, their average weekly time spent on artistic activities were about five to 10 hours less than that on non-artistic activities.
In 2012, the Artistic Welfare Act was passed, offering financial aids to artists. However, requirements for eligibility of welfare are strict, requiring the applicants to earn at least 1.2 million won a year through their artistic activities and be registered into the career info system by the Korean Artists Welfare Foundation.