Artists' Work Preferences in Arts Education

This thesis identifies the Artists in Schools Program (ASP) in South Korea is an attractive arts-related job for artists, and the attractiveness takes variations depending on participants’ characteristics. The theory of labour illustrates that labour supply responds positively to earnings. However, the theory of labour cannot always be applied to all types of labour. According to artists’ work preference model which is introduced by D. Throsby with Australian artists’ case, artists tend to have strong work preference for their primary artistic occupation (PAO) than earnings, and the degree of work preference is reflection of individual artists’ time allocation. In an identical circumstance, to be specific, stronger work preference for the arts will have more willingness to reduce their total earnings in order to spend more time in the arts. In order to verify the attractiveness of the ASP, the artists’ work preference model is adopted. By asking participants involved in the ASP whether they would be willing to decrease the amount of time they spend in the ASP if the rate of payment were to increase. Teaching artists’ work preference for the ASP is the result of the competing earnings from the ASP and time for PAO. From a survey conducted for this thesis, the predominant portion of teaching artists consider the ASP as only a supplementary job which supports their living while maintaining their PAO. Overall teaching artists are less willing to reduce time spent in the ASP than that of Australian artists as wage rate increases: either teaching artists who engage in the ASP only or the others with other primary artistic occupation. Nonetheless, the tendency to be negative to better earnings which above their minimum living cost is observed. The ASP teaching artists’ preference for time which is competing earnings could be relatively stronger than that of ordinary labours. Meanwhile, teaching artists’ work preference in the ASP shows variations according to participants’ characteristics such as their PAO, teaching discipline, gender, age, career educational level and self-consciousness. First, creators are willing to reduce time spent in the ASP as wage rate increases while performers increase time spent in under the identical condition. This supports artists’ work preference theory that performers are more depend on employment. Second, teaching artists in dance has the strongest preference for the ASP while, cartoon & animation desire the most to reduce time spent in the ASP as wage rate increases in the ASP. This may the reason that the majority of teaching artists in cartoon & animation is creators who has stronger work preference for arts work than others. Third, the ASP is more attractive to females. Forth, teaching artists prefer working in the ASP at their early age (21-30) and late age (51-60). In particular, more experienced teaching artists either in the ASP or PAO shows similarly higher preference for the ASP than less experienced their colleagues. Fifth, teaching artists with final education in secondary school less prefer the ASP, whereas PhD degree holders seem to have strong preference for the ASP. However, it does not mean that higher educational level is positive to the ASP. This is because the preference variation by educational level is not consistent over the all levels. Lastly, as teaching artists have clearer self-recognition, they are likely to prefer the ASP. This case is not only when teaching artists consider themselves as an arts educator but also when they think themselves as an artist. The diverse results suggest that the importance of comprehensive approach in investigating artists’ work preference.