“That would basically be me going through every dollar I have.”

Yulan Grant, 26

Yulan Grant used to spend half of her week earning $25 an hour as an art handler at the New Museum, where she carefully transported heavy pieces of contemporary art. But her days at galleries, warehouses and museums ended in early March, and with that, part of her income.

She has not stepped foot in an art gallery for more than three weeks.

“We just can’t work,” said Ms. Grant, who has had respiratory issues since she was a child in Jamaica. “It’s really unsafe for us to do so. If you are taking care of a piece that requires more than one person — which most pieces require — you can’t do social distancing.”

In addition to her gig at the museum, she had been supplementing her income by working as a D.J. Under the moniker SHYBOI, Ms. Grant played techno, house and soca music at Brooklyn nightspots and toured overseas where she also played festivals. But as clubs were forced to close, festivals canceled or postponed and global travel restrictions enacted, she lost another source of income.

Ms. Grant was supposed to be touring in Europe until April, for which she would have earned $5,000.

Now, she spends hours in the Brooklyn apartment she shares with two other roommates, one of whom also works in the nightlife business, searching for online jobs. So far, she has earned some income doing mixes and playing one show online, but that is not enough to cover rent and her private health insurance.

“Even though I have absolutely no work right now,” she said, “I still need to find money every month to make sure my policy doesn’t run out during the middle of a pandemic.”

She hopes she can use her knowledge of art to find archiving work for magazines and galleries, but the search has been fruitless. Many freelancers like her are competing for the same jobs.

Her worries go beyond how she will pay her bills if there is an extended shutdown. Even after that, she fears what will happen to nightclubs and galleries when the pandemic passes.