Park Ji-won is a writer for The Korea Times who has been covering a wide range of topics from Korea’s culture to its politics. An avid journalism enthusiast to the core, Ji-won brings a thoughtful and unique perspective to every topic she covers. On weekends, you'll often find her contemplating life’s purpose on a yoga mat — with a cup of quality tea in hand. A native Korean speaker by birth and fluent in English through her work, she went to college in Japan and is learning Chinese and French — hoping to add Polish, Russian and Thai to the mix.
Performing arts revenue nearly doubled last year from 2020
A scene from the French original musical, “Notre Dame de Paris,” during a press conference at the Sejong Center for the Performing Arts, Nov. 18. Courtesy of Mast Entertainment
By Park Ji-won
By Park Ji-won
The Korean performance market posted a total of 307.1 billion ($258.3 million) in sales last year, 1.8 times more than that of the year 2020, or 107.2 billion won, according to data from the Korea Performing Arts Box Office Information System (KOPIS), Sunday.
The figures improved after the government introduced eased social distancing measures in February, allowing customers to leave one seat empty between each customer group, which worked positively for sales. Before the modification, members of the audience had to leave one seat between one another, meaning that theaters were only able to sell less than 70 percent of the total seats.
By month, the change gradually boosted sales as time passed, from 3.7 billion won in January of 2021, the lowest month, to 52.4 billion won in December, which is 48 times larger than that of December 2020.
By genre, musicals were the most popular performing art in Korea, with 234.6 billion won in sales last year, accounting for 76.4 percent of total sales across the performing arts. Sales from classical music concerts and plays reached 33.4 billion won and 25.3 billion won, respectively. Revenues from dance performances and operas stood at 7.1 billion and 4.2 billion won, respectively.