[Report] "How Did You Hang in There?"... Young People Ask How to Make a Living Through Art

A Firsthand Look at the 2026 Art Job Fair: Number of Participating Companies and Institutions Increases from 46 to 64

Beyond Artists and Planners: The Expanding Roles in Art—Marketing, Spatial Direction, and AI

Average Annual Income from Art

"Is it okay to start a business alone?"
"How many people did you start with at first?"
"But... how did you endure?"

Yonhap News Agency

Questions ranged from whether it’s fine to start a business alone, to how many people it takes to launch a company, and how to bridge the gap between production and business. Ultimately, every question led to one: how did you manage to persevere?

On the afternoon of September 10 at the Hongik University Daehangno Art Center in Jongno-gu, Seoul, participants attending the "2026 Art Job Fair" sat across a small table from Jung Changyun, CEO of Divein Group. Instead of tips on how to get hired, participants were far more interested in how to pursue art as a long-term career. Many of those who joined the coffee chat session that day had experience in production or freelance work.

When asked what kind of employees the company is currently seeking, CEO Jung mentioned “marketer” first, rather than artist or exhibition planner. He explained that while there are many people involved in art, planning, and production, there is also a need for people who can commercially develop these works. Because the domestic market alone has limitations in converting interest into purchases, he said that those with global business experience are also favored.

Even when considering entry-level hiring, actual experience outweighs academic background. CEO Jung cited the example of turning one’s own artwork into merchandise and selling it. He noted that the act of not only creating art but also turning it into a product and presenting it to consumers provides valuable experience in understanding the market.

Jung Changyun, CEO of Divein Group. CEO Jung emphasized the need for talents who have marketing capabilities to commercially present works in the art field and a sense of space production. Divein

Divein Group’s projects also illustrate the evolving boundaries of art-related work. The company creates "art stays" by combining artists’ works with hotel rooms and then sells the art installed in these rooms as products. Artists collaborating with the company are provided with production costs and a portion of profits generated from the rooms, paid out as licensing fees. CEO Jung explained that rather than immediately labeling this as a fully established “job model,” he sees it as a platform on which artists can build their portfolios and springboard into new forms of collaboration in the future.

By moving canvases into hotel rooms, new roles have emerged that are difficult to define with conventional job titles. CEO Jung described the people they currently need as “somewhere between an interior designer and a director.” Colors used for painting can look entirely different on a room’s walls, lighting, and furniture. Applying the visual language of a work of art to the entire space means not only considering the overall aesthetics, but also the preferences of the paying guests who will actually stay in the room.

A few steps away, at the job counseling booths, a different set of concerns was underway. A recruiter from the Goyang Cultural Foundation said that they do not expect remarkable career backgrounds from entry-level applicants. Instead, they focus on what experience the applicant has related to the desired role, what was learned in the process, and how shortcomings have been addressed. When asked whether they prioritize academic major or practical project experience, the response was clear: “From a hiring perspective, experience is more important.” The recruiter added that job seekers’ skillsets have risen to the point that it’s now rare to see applicants with no relevant experience at all.

On the 9th, job seekers are checking the recruitment schedule at the '2026 Arts Job Fair - Working with Arts' held at Hongik University Daehakro Art Center in Jongno-gu, Seoul. Photo by Yonhap News

On the same day, at the nearby House of Artists, participants in the "AI Self-Branding Bootcamp" sat with their laptops, revisiting their careers.

One of them was Kim Nahyun, 23, who was preparing for jobs in crafts and visual design. Up to now, her work experience had been in office jobs and entrepreneurship, and her resume was organized around her administrative career. Kim said, “I came to the fair because I wanted to see what other fields are out there,” adding that shifting into the arts made her reconsider how to organize and present her experience.

On this day, artificial intelligence (AI) served less as a tool to write one's cover letter and more as a questionnaire to help participants reflect on their experiences. Following a pre-arranged Claude prompt, participants outlined in detail who they are and what work they have done. “What I liked best was being able to break things down and check who I am and exactly what I’ve done, even within the prompt,” Kim said. Rather than scrapping her past experience in office jobs and entrepreneurship and starting fresh, she chose to identify ways to connect those experiences to new positions in the arts. Kim said she plans to use the prompt she received during the session when creating her portfolio in the future.

This year’s fair thus focused on broadening the pathways for work and activities, beyond the narrow lens of “getting a job.” In addition to job counseling and resume clinics, there were coffee chats with practitioners in planning, administration, distribution, and entrepreneurship, as well as networking between artists and companies or institutions, contract and copyright consultations, and actor auditions. The organizers also emphasized that their aim is to increase collaboration opportunities not only within the arts industry, but across industrial and social sectors.

On the 9th, the at Hongik University in Jongno-gu, Seoul, hosted the "2026 Art Job Fair - Working Through Art." Photo by Yonhap News Agency

The number of seekers and employers is also increasing. According to the Arts Management Support Center, the number of companies and organizations participating in job counseling has risen by 18, from 46 last year to 64 this year. Last year, there were 1,952 participants, with the current year’s numbers still being finalized. Since the event was launched in 2018, it has been held seven times including this year. Beginning last year, the joint hosting by the Korea Artists Welfare Foundation expanded the program into a comprehensive fair that now covers both recruitment and artist collaborations. This year is, officially, the second integrated job fair following last year’s format.

The fair’s focus on not only "where to get a job" but also "how to sustain one's activities" has clear reasons. According to the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism’s 2024 Artist Status Survey, the average individual income earned by artists from artistic activities in 2023 was KRW 10,550,000 per year. A total of 61.7% of full-time artists worked as freelancers. This structure makes it difficult to describe an artist's work and livelihood strictly in terms of joining a company.

The Arts Management Support Center also does not limit the fair’s goals to simple hiring. A representative said, "We hope this event helps job seekers connect their skills to real-world contexts and explore alternative career paths, while companies and organizations find talented collaborators and partners. Our aim is to create a sustainable ecosystem for employment, where the on-site experiences of artists lead not only to recruitment, but also to new projects and opportunities for continued professional activity."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.