1998

Nominated resident researcher with the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles directed by archaeologist Salvatore Settis, Viola takes part in a cycle of seminars entitled Representing the Passions. He begins to study passion and the depiction of extreme emotional situations in medieval and Renaissance art, a theme that he was to continue to develop in the years thereafter. He produces his first interactive graphic computer work, an installation called The Tree of Knowledge, in conjunction with programmer Bernd Lintermann from the Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie in Karlsruhe. The exhibition on this research moves to the Whitney Museum and to the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam.