Ara Gaya Cultural Festival
🗓️ 2026.09.18 ~ 2026.09.20
The Haman Ara Gaya Culture Festival is a representative local cultural festival designed to shed new light on the brilliant history and culture of Ara Gaya from a modern perspective. It also aims to discover various historical and cultural contents so that many people can experience the value of Ara Gaya easily and enjoyably. For three days, the festival transforms the area around the Marisan Tumuli in Haman-gun, Gyeongsangnam-do, into a space where an ancient state and its living heritage take center stage.
What distinguishes this festival from the typical historical reenactment is the sheer degree of participation it offers. During the festival period, various performances and celebratory presentations themed around the history and culture of Ara Gaya are held, providing visitors with a rich array of sights. In particular, programs that anyone of all ages can participate in are prepared, including a historical experience course where one can directly feel the life and culture of Ara Gaya, as well as cavalry warrior experiences and procession experiences. These are not pageants to observe from a distance — they are activities to step into.
The festival also carries a distinctly youthful energy. The Marisan Healing series forms a core part of this. From Ye (Art) to Yo (Song), Bi (Fly), Mu (Dance), So (Stroll), Bo (Step), and Ui (Clothing), the series interprets Ara Gaya culture through a broad spectrum of creative media. Notably, the Marisan Healing Ye (Art) performance program is directly planned and executed by young people, while the Youth Orchestra, youth busking, and an AI Video Contest reinforce the same forward-looking spirit.
The festival’s historical narratives come to life through programs such as the World Intangible Heritage Festival, the Ara Gaya Royal Guard Changing Ceremony, and the King Ara Procession. Around the Marisan Tumuli area, a wide range of experience events for families and tourists are held, from hands-on crafts to food tastings. And as the highlight of the festival, the theme performance ‘Ara Hongryeon’ unfolds with spectacular fireworks, delivering a special emotion where the history and culture, as well as the tradition and modernity, of Ara Gaya harmonize. In the end, the Haman Ara Gaya Culture Festival is a venue for a living historical and cultural festival — one where visitors go beyond simply watching and instead enter into the history of Ara Gaya by seeing, hearing, and experiencing it firsthand.
Pre-event
The pre-event sets the stage with rituals and pageantry drawn from Ara Gaya’s spiritual and royal traditions:
- Ara Gaya Cheonshinje (Heavenly Ritual)
- King Ara Procession
Pre-event Celebration Performance
- Pre-event Celebration Performance
Opening Ceremony and Post-event
- Opening Ceremony
- VR Drawing Performance
- Fireworks, Ara Hongryeon
- Special Performance (Kim Soo-chan, Kim Ji-hyun)
Museum Programs
The museum programs span the widest range of activities, combining hands-on craft workshops, interactive play, and live performances:
- Fringe Performance (Balloons, Magic, Bubbles)
- Ara Gaya Traditional Play Yard
- World Intangible Heritage Festival: Youth, Meeting the Future of Intangible Heritage (Namsadang Nori, Tightrope Walking)
- Youth Orchestra
- Ara Gaya Musical Gala Show
- Marisan Healing Ui (Clothing): Wearing Ara Gaya
- AI Video Contest (Video Promotion Create)
- Marisan Healing Bo (Step)
- Making 3D Ara Gaya with Wood
- 3D Block Miniature Experience
- Making Ara Gaya Flame Leather Keyrings
- Namduyungseong Ring, Ara Hongryeon Deform Block, Clicker Keycap, Gilt-bronze Crown Shrinkles, Dreamcatcher, Ara Gaya Relic Mini Terrarium
- Ara Hongryeon Slime, Flame Pattern Worry Stone, Relic Polymer Clay Accessories, Marisan Tumuli The Ocean Diorama
- Haman-inspired Art Canvas Action Painting
- Containing the Treasures of Haman
- Making Ara Gaya Pottery Mini-book Keyrings
- Tasting Haman
Ara Gaya Experience Center Programs
- Sand Art Performance
- Ara Gaya History Experience Course: Ara Gaya Play-ground! 2
- Blacksmith Ironware Armor Making Experience
- Pony Feeding Experience
Marisan Tumuli Programs
The Marisan Tumuli programs unfold both day and night, with processions, performances, and interactive experiences set against the backdrop of the ancient burial mounds:
- Walking through the night of “Ara Gaya” (Ara Gaya Flame Garden)
- Marisan Healing Yo (Song): Open Festival, Youth Busking
- Marisan Healing Bi (Fly): The Dreams of Youth Flying Toward the Sky
- Marisan Healing Mu (Dance): Gestures of Youth, Dancing Ara Gaya
- Marisan Healing Ye (Art): World Heritage Awakened by Youth through Art
- Ara Gaya Cultural Experience (Costumes, Crowns, Goods)
- Ara Gaya Cavalry Warrior Experience
- Royal Guard ∙ Procession Experience
- Royal Guard Changing Ceremony
- Marisan Healing So (Stroll): Walking through the Ara Gaya Night
Promotion, Exhibition, and Food Events
Alongside the performances and hands-on experiences, the festival includes exhibition and market events that round out the visit:
- Engraving Gaya in Gold
- Promotion for Reducing the Use of Disposable Products
- Carbon Neutral Point Registration Promotion
- Multi-use Container Supply and Collection Center
- Youth Dining Table! The Taste of Ara Gaya!
- Ara Gaya Taste! Market Street
Linked Events
A set of linked events extends the festival’s reach, connecting Ara Gaya culture with seasonal traditions and local institutions:
- Chuseok Ara Gaya Market
- Goodwill Store Eco-friendly Program & Climate Crisis Promotion
- Gisan-hak Festival (Drone Experience)
- Masan University Local Growth Human Resource Training Program
📍 Address: 153-31 Gobun-gil, Gaya-eup, Haman-gun, Gyeongsangnam-do
🛏️ Accommodation near the event
💰 Fee: Free
📞 Inquiry: 055-585-9400
⭐️ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aragaya_/
🖥️ Website: http://www.araje.or.kr/
Ara Gaya was a state within the Gaya confederacy, a group of polities that occupied the southern part of the Korean Peninsula from around the 1st to the 6th century CE. Its political center was in present-day Haman County, South Gyeongsang Province, and its territory extended toward the southern coast, where it made use of harbors along key maritime routes.
The state’s economy was based largely on iron production and trade. Excavations in the Haman area have recovered iron ingots, weapons, armor, and smelting-related materials, indicating that iron was both a local industry and an export. Pottery and other artifacts from neighboring regions also point to regular exchange with Baekje, Silla, and other Gaya polities, as well as with societies in China and Japan. Ara Gaya’s coastal position allowed it to participate in these networks, though its location between larger kingdoms also shaped its political options.
Archaeological sites in the region include earthen burial mounds and fortified hill settlements. These reveal a society with defined social roles and distinctive local craft traditions. Historical records and archaeological evidence together suggest that Ara Gaya maintained a degree of autonomy until it was absorbed by Silla in the mid-6th century.
This history is the basis of the Haman Ara Gaya Cultural Festival 2026. The program focuses on ironworking and pottery demonstrations, visits to the relevant archaeological sites, and exhibitions by contemporary artists whose work responds to the material culture of Ara Gaya. The festival presents the kingdom in terms of what is actually known about it, allowing visitors to engage with the evidence directly rather than through a simplified or dramatized version of the past.
