SEOUL-- South Korean artists released an average 3.8 artistic works to the public in 2021, a sharp drop from 7.8 pieces in 2018, attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic, a government survey showed Friday.

According to the culture ministry's triennial survey on 5,000 art industry people, the classical music scene was the busiest this year out of 14 art sectors, with 6.4 public works released on average, followed by 5.8 pieces by Korean traditional musicians and 4.7 shows from the entertainment industry.

The poll also showed that 14.4 percent of the artists participated in a project outside Korea in 2021. The number was 23.1 percent in 2018.

An individual artist earned an average 7.55 million won (US$6,300) from artistic activities in 2021, down from 12.81 million won three years ago. Some 41 percent said they had no income at all.

Among the surveyed artists, the percentage of copyright holders rose to 26.9 percent this year from 25 percent in 2018. About 75 percent of pop musicians have copyrighted material, while 59.9 percent of cartoon writers and 43.3 percent of literary authors have copyrighted works.

Out of the 5,000 respondents, the ministry survey showed that 55.1 percent are full-time artists, down by 2.3 percentage points from three years ago.

Source: Yonhap News Agency