Ângelo César Cardoso de Sousa was born on 2nd February 1938, in Mozambique.

Thanks to a scholarship in Fine Arts from the Caixa Económica Postal in Lourenço Marques, he moved to Portugal when he was 17, and settled in Oporto. He enrolled in the painting course at the School of Fine Arts in Oporto, where he was from 1955 to 1963, joining the faculty for almost four decades and becoming the first full professor in Painting at that school, retiring in 2000. It was also in Oporto that he held his first solo exhibition (1959) with Almada Negreiros, at the Galeria Divulgação.

Between 1961 and 1969, he worked as a set and costume designer at the Teatro Experimental do Porto. In the mid-sixties, he devoted himself mainly to sculpture. In the academic year 1967-68, he attended St. Martin's School of Art and the Slade School of Fine Arts (London), with a scholarship from the British Council (awarded by the British Government). In London, he acquired his first film camera and began to take photographs systematically.

In 1972, he became Aggregate Professor at ESBAP. That year, he returned to painting, composing his first "envelope paintings" with trichromatic paints. From 1972/73 onwards, he began to use acrylic paints, composing his colour palette using only primary colours.

Only in 2001, he started to work with the diversity of acrylic colours available on the market. Throughout his life he drew, having published several books of drawings.

Ângelo de Sousa passed away on the 29th of March 2001, in Oporto.