Several of my images are animated gifs of the different options available for my products. I have not been able to get them animated. Is there are way to do this with Viart?

The animation is removed because most likely resizing functionality for images is turned on in your shop. If you want to upload such kind of images, then you are to turn off the automatic resizing of images and resize them manually. This can be done via Settings > Products > Products Settings > 'Images' tab.
 
Regards,
ViArt Team