Background
De Sousa was born in Lourenco Marques (now Maputo), Mozambique, on February 2, 1938.
Porto, Portugal
Ângelo de Sousa studied at the University of Porto between 1955 and 1962.
Porto, Portugal
Ângelo de Sousa taught at the University of Porto from 1962 until 2000.
artist draftsman educator sculptor
De Sousa was born in Lourenco Marques (now Maputo), Mozambique, on February 2, 1938.
Ângelo de Sousa moved to Porto in 1955, where he studied painting at the School of Fine Arts (now the University of Porto). It was there that he received his degree in painting with the highest mark, 20. He graduated in 1962.
De Sousa was invited to teach at the School of Fine Arts (now the University of Porto). In 1962 he became an Assistant Professor. He lectured there until 2000 when he finally retired as a Full Professor.
His first solo exhibition was held in 1959 in Galeria Divulgação (Porto) together with Almada Negreiros. This show was the first in a cycle of exhibits organized by José Pulido Valente, then an Architecture student. His aim was to present works of a young painters side by side with renowned ones.
In the following years, his artworks were displayed at such Portuguese galleries as Galeria Divulgação in Porto and Lisbon, the Galeria Buchholz, Galeria 111, Cooperativa Árvore, the Galeria Alvarez, Porto, and the Sociedade Nacional de Belas Artes (National Society of Fine Arts). Since then his paintings have been shown worldwide.
In 1964 Ângelo de Sousa became one of the founders of Cooperativa Árvore. At the end of the 1960s, the artist lived for a brief time in London. In 1968 became part of a group known as Quatro Vintes. It included his friends and colleagues Jorge Pinheiro, Armando Alves, and José Rodrigues. The group chose this name because all the artists represented had been awarded the highest grade in their Licenciatura (Licenciate degree). Its primary goal was the presentation of the artists’ artworks in group exhibitions.
Ângelo de Sousa was an avant-garde, experimental and minimalist artist. He was known to use various techniques and supports during his long-lasting and successful career, including drawing, painting, sculpting, photography, film, video as well as scenography. The critics saw him as an extremely creative and impulsive artist.
In his painting, Ângelo de Sousa to Mondrian was influenced by Expressionism. He was interested in the oriental print, the primitive and exotic arts and Art Brut, Expressionism. The artist was inspired by artists like Klee and Kandinsky and movements like the Colour Field, the Post Painterly Abstraction, the Op and the Pop Art.
The "restless movement" of the films also presented in his metal sculptures from the 1960s and the 1970s. The author called them the "small machineries."
Among his one-man shows there were some outstanding ones, like Ângelo - Escultura e Desenho, do Movimento Os Quatro Vintes, at the Galeria Alvarez Art Gallery and the Cooperativa Árvore, Porto, in 1970. The major retrospectives were held at the Serralves Museum, in 1993 and 2001, respectively for drawing and painting and photography and cinema, and the one in 2003 on drawing, at the Centro de Arte Moderna of Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian.
Starting from 1956 Ângelo de Sousa participated in collective exhibitions not only in Portugal but also abroad, in galleries and museums. For instance, he participated in the XIII Bienal de São Paulo in 1975, and in the Bienal de Veneza in 1978.
In 1995 Ângelo de Sousa together with Gustavo Barros became the first university professors of respectively Painting and Sculpture Courses in the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Porto. Five years later, Ângelo de Sousa retired.
Ângelo de Sousa was an original artist in concerning the choice of materials for the presentation of his artworks. In some of his catalogues there were texts from such authors as João Cabral de Mello e Neto, Maria Filomena Molder, Rui Mário Gonçalves, Eugénio de Andrade, Fernando Pernes, João Pinharanda, Alexandre Melo e Bernardo Pinto de Almeida. Some of de Sousa's drawings illustrate books by Maria Alzira Seixo, Fiama Hasse Pais Brandão, Eugénio de Andrade, Mário Cláudio.
In the year 2008, along with Eduardo Souto Moura, de Sousa represented Portugal at the 11th Venice International Architecture Festival. There he premiered the movie "Ângelo de Sousa - Tudo o que sou capaz" of the director Jorge Silva Melo (2010).
sem titulo
Sem titulo
Um Ocre
Um
unknown title
unknown title
1-II-5-G
Pastel em papel
sem titulo
unknown title
unknown title
Pintura
86-3-15Q
Sem titulo
Pintura
Sem Titulo
Pintura
Sem titulo
Sem titulo
Grande Fragmento - Devorando (3-2-5)
Sem título
Sem título
Sem título
Untitled (0603)
Untitled (1299)
La Maison Rouge
Untitled
Untitled
Untitled
Ângelo de Sousa was involved in political or civic causes whenever he thought it necessary. For instance, he was the senior advisor in Porto of Jorge Sampaio’s campaign for President in 1995.
The artistic discussions have never affected Ângelo de Sousa. He has always chosen to keep far from the neo-realistic debates and from arguments about figuration and abstraction. He was a man of strong convictions. Those who worked closely with him said he was a cordial, extroverted, irreverent and generous person.