Born in Belo Horizonte, Angelo de Aquino moved to Rio de Janeiro with his family in 1952, where he left for only one season in Milan (1970–1972) and another in Paris in the 1980’s. He begins his artistic training in the studio of painter and sculptor Roberto Moriconi (1932–1993).
Throughout his career, which began in 1964, he has held numerous solo exhibitions both in Brazil and abroad. In 1965, he participated in the historic exhibition Opinião 65 at Museu de Arte Moderna do Rio de Janeiro (MAM/RJ), curated by Jean Boghici and Ceres Franco. In the same year, he is one of the organizers of the event Proposta 65, at Fundação Armando Álvares Penteado (FAAP), São Paulo. In Milan, he exhibited at Centro Tool in 1971 and Centro Forme the following year. In 1973, he performed solo exhibitions at the Akumulatory 2 in Poznán, Poland, and at Centro de Arte y Comunicación (CAYC) in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Back in Brazil, he makes video works and artist films, of which he is considered one of the precursors in the country. In 1974, he organized, with Walter Zanini, the exhibition Prospectiva 74 at Museu de Arte Contemporânea da Universidade de São Paulo (MAC/USP). In the early 80’s, he began to dedicate himself to figurative painting. In 1984, after several other exhibitions, his best known creation was born, the vira-cores Rex. Hearts, still lifes and self-portraits, always marked by a continuous interrogation of color, desire and humor, are other striking themes of his pictorial production. In 1994, he held a commemorative exhibition of 10 years of the character Rex, at Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil in Rio de Janeiro, entitled Rex Faz Dez. In 2004, commemorating Rex’s 20th anniversary and 40 years of painting, he made a retrospective of his work at Fundação Casa França-Brasil in Rio de Janeiro, his last major exhibition still in life.
In the year 2007 Angelo de Aquino dies. Postmortem, his work was exhibited at Galeria Marcia Barrozo do Amaral which, to honor him, showed his self-portraits; Between December 2008 and January 2009, Caixa Cultural Rio de Janeiro hosted the exhibition Identidade do Artista – Angelo de Aquino Self Promotions Inc., in which his book project was viewed alongside some of his documentation and some others works from the same period. In 2013, Galeria Múl.ti.plo Contemporânea presented Destempo, an exhibition with works on paper made in the 70’s. He also had works presented in the collective exhibitions: Um dia terá que ter terminado 1969/74 (2010), at MAC/USP, in Sao Paulo; Europalia, Brussels (2011–2012), Videoarte Brasil 1970’s, at ICA Philadelphia (2014) and Opinião 65, 50 anos depois, an exhibition that took place simultaneously at MAM/RJ and Galeria Pinakotheke, in Rio de Janeiro (2015).