{"id":641849,"date":"2013-02-08T11:17:23","date_gmt":"2013-02-08T16:17:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.ted.com\/?p=69066"},"modified":"2013-02-08T13:52:32","modified_gmt":"2013-02-08T18:52:32","slug":"8-views-of-tirana-albania-with-its-bright-multicolored-buildings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/641849","title":{"rendered":"8 views of Tirana, Albania — with its bright, multicolored buildings"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Tirana-4b\"<\/a><\/p>\n

A view of a street in Tirana, where the buildings have been splashed with color\u2014 for a political purpose. Photo: Merlin and Rebecca<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Edi Rama — the mayor of Tirana, Albania, for 11 years — was an artist before a politician.<\/p>\n

\u201cI still paint. I love the joy that color can give to our lives and to our communities,\u201d says Rama in today\u2019s talk<\/a>, filmed at TEDxThessaloniki<\/a>. \"EdiEdi Rama: Take back your city with paint<\/span><\/a>\u201cI try to bring something of the artist in me to my politics.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tirana, Albania\u2019s capital city, was downtrodden when Rama took office. The city budget was squandered, corruption was rampant and crime was the norm. But Rama had an idea to raise the spirits of his town — he painted a grey building a bright orange.<\/p>\n

As Rama set out to have more of the city painted in loud colors and bold designs, he met resistance from other countries in the European Union. He was asked to opt for more neutral colors.<\/p>\n

\u201cI told them no. Compromise in colors is grey,\u201d explains Rama. \u201cWhen colors came out everywhere, a mood of change started transforming the spirit of the people \u2026 People started to drop less litter in the streets. They started to pay taxes. They started to feel something they\u2019d forgotten \u2026 Beauty was giving people a feeling of being protected. This was not a misplaced feeling — crime did fall.\u201d<\/p>\n

To hear more about the radical transformation of Tirana, and about Rama\u2019s thoughts on how politicians are not all the same and can bring hope to people through seemingly small actions, watch his moving talk<\/a>. And here, see just some of the buildings in Tirana that got the color treatment.<\/p>\n

\"Tirana-1\"<\/p>\n

The first building in Tirana to get splashed with paint. Here is the before and after comparison. Photo: Edi Rama<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\"Tirana-2\"<\/p>\n

The before and after of an apartment building. Photo: Edi Rama<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\"Tirana-3\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Yet another gorgeously multicolored building. Photo: David Dufresne\/Flickr<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\"Tirana-4\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Rama says, \u201cAs a result of the project, international artists turned whole living blocks in central Tirana into unique works of contemporary art. \u201c Photo: David Dufresne\/Flickr<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\"Tirana-5\"<\/a><\/p>\n

An undulating rainbow on the side of a building. Photo: David Dufresne\/Flickr<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\"This<\/a><\/p>\n

This building gets the block treatment. Photo: David Dufresne\/Flickr<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\"Tirana-9\"<\/a><\/p>\n

A building gets the blues. Photo: Merlin and Rebecca<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A view of a street in Tirana, where the buildings have been splashed with color\u2014 for a political purpose. Photo: Merlin and Rebecca Edi Rama — the mayor of Tirana, Albania, for 11 years — was an artist before a politician. \u201cI still paint. I love the joy that color can give to our lives […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7344,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-641849","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7344"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=641849"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641849\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=641849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=641849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=641849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}