Among the first students to join Cairo's School of Fine Arts in 1908, Youssef Kamel was part of a generation of modernist artists in Egypt often referred to as the Al-Ruwwad Group (The Pioneers Group). He studied under the Italian painter Paolo Forcella and worked alongside influential Egyptian artists such as Ragheb Ayad and Mahmoud Mokhtar. In 1925, Kamel received a scholarship to attend Rome’s Royal Academy of Fine Arts. He studied under Umberto Coromaldi who, like Forcella, followed the Italian 19th century Macchiaioli movement, which focused on oil painting techniques that emphasise patches of light in nature. Kamel transfers this attention to light and colour through soft brush strokes in his landscapes and portraits. He returned to Cairo in 1929 to work as a professor of painting at the School of Fine Arts, later serving as its director from 1950 to 1953. Kamel also worked as a curator and director of the Museum of Egyptian Modern Art from 1948 to 1949.