Korea is rapidly becoming a multicultural society, and its cultural functionalities and diversities are being expanded through art education. However, we need to look carefully at the many diverse art education programs, and examine the current situation of Korean art education through continued interest and monitoring to see whether it is following the desirable path advocated by the many experts. In the US, the functional role of art education is being expanded so that it may fulfill the basic purpose of multicultural education such as nurturing racially diverse students into American citizens, embracing cultural and racial diversities as well as minorities, and establishing the American cultural identity. In this paper, we will review the most prominent art education program in the US, that in the New York city and Rochester, New York. We will also review the administrative and functional role of the art education infrastructure by studying the preservice art teacher program. In addition, we will investigate what is meant by “life-connected teaching” that is advocated by some experts, and use it as the basis to study how a class is developed, and how it affects real students' learning. We find that the results can be summarized in three necessary conditions. First, the basic philosophy and concept of multicultural art education need to be established. Second, a partnership between schools, universities, and local community need to be established. Finally, sufficient funds needs to be secured to ensure a high quality multicultural art education.