Obituary: Bill Viola, artist

A visitor admires American artist Bill Viola's self portrait at the Artist's Selfportraits Hall at Gallerie degli Uffizi Museum on July 10, 2023 in Florence, Italy. Photo: Getty Images

Works by video artist Bill Viola graced some of the world’s greatest stages. From the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles to the Paris Opera to the Lincoln Centre, the New York-raised and educated artist both produced his own works and lent them to augment a range of operatic productions, utilising technology to bring a fresh dimension to a classic art form. Viola began developing video art in the mid-1970s and while living and working in Florence, Italy he had his first major European exhibition in 1975. Moving back to the US Viola had exhibitions at New York’s Museum of Modern Art, the Museum of the Moving Image and the Whitney Museum of Art, and represented his country at the 46th Venice Biennale in 1995. Viola regularly exhibited overseas, audiences the world over being entranced by his interpretations of basic human experiences. Viola died on July 12 aged 73. — Agencies