'Art Contest Goes Ontact Due to COVID-19' Samsung Life Art Contest Celebrates 40th Anniversary

The Longest-Running Domestic Youth Art Competition Over 40 Years Since the 1st Event in 1981
The First Art Competition to Conduct the Entire Process of Submission, Judging, Finals, and Awards in an 'Ontact' Format

[Asia Economy Reporter Oh Hyung-gil] Samsung Life Insurance announced on the 21st that it will hold the '40th Samsung Life Insurance Art Competition' for elementary, middle, high school, and university students nationwide.

The Samsung Life Insurance Art Competition is a representative social contribution activity of Samsung Life Insurance. It began in 1981 under the name National On-site Drawing Competition, then evolved through the Blue Star Drawing Festival in 1998, the Bichumi Drawing Festival in 2000, and the Samsung Life Youth Art Contest in 2009, reaching its current form. Over the past 40 years, with a cumulative participation of 5.47 million people until last year, it has established itself as the most prestigious art competition in Korea.

This year's art competition, under the concept of 'A Dream-Painting Art House, Misullang,' will be conducted entirely in an ontact (online contact) format from registration, judging, finals, to awards. Preliminary registration is open from today until October 18th. Students wishing to participate can visit the competition website and upload images of their works. The process is optimized for mobile environments, allowing participation and submission of works all at once via mobile.

Notably, unlike previous years where finalists gathered at the Samsung Human Center to compete in the finals, this year the finals will also be held online in an ontact format. This is the first ontact practical competition in the history of domestic art contests. Additionally, instead of an offline awards ceremony, an online announcement performance event will be held via real-time streaming watched by the finalists, which is expected to attract significant attention.

Furthermore, to celebrate the 40th anniversary, a digital art category reflecting the interests of the millennial generation has been newly established. In addition to the existing pure painting category for youth, new character and webtoon categories have been added, making a total of three competition categories.

The painting category is divided into four sections: lower elementary (grades 1-3), upper elementary (grades 4-6), middle school, and high school. The preliminary round has a free theme. The 100 participants who pass the preliminaries will compete in the finals on November 14th under real-time video supervision, selecting themes and performing practical drawing. In the finals, a total of 1,000 awards will be given, including one grand prize winner per category, excellence awards, and merit awards. The highest award winner in the high school category will receive the Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Award and a scholarship of 5 million KRW as a prize.

The digital art category was newly established to commemorate the 40th anniversary and reflects the trend of increasing demand for 'character and webtoon' artists as future career aspirations among youth. It is open to individuals or teams (up to 3 members) aged 14 and above, including middle school, high school, and university students. Cross-application between the character and webtoon categories is also allowed. A total of 44 teams will be awarded, including 1 Grand Award team, 6 Best Award teams, and 15 Good Award teams, with a total prize of 15 million KRW.

A Samsung Life Insurance official stated, “The 40th Samsung Life Insurance Art Competition this year will be conducted entirely in an ontact format from preliminaries to the awards ceremony. With the new digital art categories of character and webtoon, we hope many students will participate and freely express their creativity and imagination.”

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