The government is putting the brakes on the practice of competitively building museums and art galleries in regional areas. Although local governments have rushed to construct facilities to attract tourists, visitor numbers have declined, increasing the financial burden. The government plans to prioritize support for using existing facilities over new construction, and to determine whether to re-designate hub facilities that receive state subsidies based on five years of operating performance.
According to government sources on the 26th, the Ministry of Planning and Budget will manage the "hub cultural facility expansion project" as a separate project category starting with the 2027 budget. The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism plans to establish a five-year mid- to long-term plan by comprehensively considering regional representativeness, level of interest, and surrounding infrastructure conditions, and to select recipients of state funding centered on the museums and art galleries included in the plan.
First, for museums and art galleries, the government will refrain from new construction and review support mainly for projects using existing facilities. For performance venues, rather than building new ones, the government will designate existing theaters where national youth arts organizations can be based as "designated national theaters" for support. The aim is to prevent overlapping investment by the national government, local governments, and the private sector in similar cultural facilities.
The designation period for hub cultural facilities is five years. When the period ends, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism can evaluate operating results and performance to re-designate or terminate the designation. In areas where branches of national cultural facilities have already been established, the government will refrain from additional support, and has also set up a mechanism for the Ministry of Planning and Budget to review the appropriateness of project costs through a specialized agency.
"The intent is to reduce the practice of first putting up a building and worrying about visitors and operating costs later," a Ministry of Planning and Budget official said. "We will also examine whether facilities can handle content and operating costs after opening."
Behind the government's move to curb new construction is the steady increase in museums and art galleries. According to the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, museums and art galleries nationwide rose by 44, from 1,164 in early 2020 to 1,208 in early 2025. The figure includes national and public facilities as well as private and university facilities combined.
The increase was particularly pronounced in regional areas. In South Jeolla Province, museums and art galleries rose by 11, from 95 to 106, and in South Chungcheong Province they increased by 9, from 66 to 75. In North Jeolla Province the number rose by 7, from 59 to 66, in Seoul by 6, from 174 to 180, and in North Gyeongsang Province by 5, from 81 to 86.
From the perspective of local governments, the result stems from the fact that they can achieve tourist attraction, old downtown regeneration, and city branding enhancement all at once. It is easy to promote as an achievement for a local government head, and if pursued as a national facility, state financial investment can also be expected.
Despite this increase in facilities, visitor numbers actually declined. Annual visitors to museums and art galleries nationwide fell by 23.75 million, from 118.01 million in 2019 to 94.26 million in 2024. Visitors per facility also dropped 23.0%, from 101,385 to 78,034.
In South Jeolla Province, where facilities increased the most, visitors fell 41.0% over the same period. In North Jeolla Province they declined 34.1%, in North Gyeongsang Province 13.2%, in Seoul 11.0%, and in South Chungcheong Province 5.9%. Even though viewing demand has not recovered to pre-COVID-19 levels, museums and art galleries have instead increased.
Operating difficulties from declining visitors lead to a financial burden centered on public facilities. Since facilities must be maintained even with few visitors, the state and local financial burden can accumulate each year.
In fact, the number of public museums and art galleries drawing fewer than 50,000 visitors a year rose by 45, from 208 in 2020 to 253 in 2025. Their share of the total also climbed 7.7 percentage points, from 46.8% to 54.5%. Facilities with fewer than 10,000 annual visitors increased from 37 to 60, while facilities drawing 100,000 or more decreased by 23, from 150 to 127.
Experts point out that the success or failure of hub cultural facilities should be found in content and operating capacity that keep residents coming back, rather than in the number of buildings. Lee Yoon-seok, a professor of urban sociology at the University of Seoul, analyzed that "hub spaces need to be created not as a simple expansion of physical space, but as a form in which programs and spaces that consider the cultural needs of local residents are organically combined."
However, there are also concerns that if the government uniformly selects recipients of state funding through a five-year plan, regional cultural demand and characteristics may not be sufficiently reflected. Jung Bo-ram, an associate research fellow at the Korea Culture and Tourism Institute, recommended that "regional cultural promotion should be led proactively by local governments."
