THE Palazzo Talenti D'Anna Viaro Martinengo Volpi di Misurata or, more manageably, the Palazzo Volpi di Misurata, was built on the Grand Canal in the early 16th century and passed through numerous hands, not all included in the list of its names, before being bought in 1917 by Giuseppe Volpi. He was an entrepreneur, diplomat, colonial governor, Fascist finance minister, saviour of distressed palazzi and creator of the Venice Film Festival, ennobled by Vittorio Emanuele III in 1913. He died in 1947 and, from 1951 until her death in 1989, his much younger second wife, Lily, was renowned as the queen of Venetian society for her annual September ball at the palazzo. Until recently, that tradition was continued by their son Count Giovanni (b. 1938), who added to a considerable inherited fortune by his success as a motorracing entrepreneur.
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