Miguel was born in 1969. The first exhibition he curated (together with Helena de Freitas) was focused on the art critic, curator and artist Ernesto de Sousa, a pivotal figure in the Portuguese art world during the 1970s: Ernesto de Sousa: Revolution My Body, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon, 1998.

Since then and until 2004, he worked as free-lance curator. Projects he curated during this period include:

- a travelling group exhibition on the pervasiveness of drawing, outside the parameters of this discipline, in contemporary art practices: The Indiscipline of Drawing, Vila Nova de Famalicão, Caldas da Rainha, Aveiro, 1999-2000 (co-curated with Nuno Faria).
- a three-year duration project that surveyed the film and video work by Portuguese artists since the 1960s, comprising solo exhibitions of thirty-one artists: SlowMotion, ESTGAD, Caldas da Rainha, 2000-2003; Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon, 2002.
- a retrospective of the photographic and film work of Angelo de Sousa, one of the key Portuguese artists that came to prominence in the 1960s: Angelo de Sousa: Without Silver, Museu de Serralves, Porto, 2001 (co-curated with João Fernandes).
- a large-scale retrospective of Luis Noronha da Costa, a long-time neglected but fundamental Portuguese artist during the 1960s and 1970s: Luis Noronha da Costa Rediscovered (1965-1983), Centro Cultural de Belém, Lisbon, 2004 (co-curated with Nuno Faria).

Since 2004, Miguel has been the curator of contemporary art at Culturgest, where he has been developing a programme (that started in December 2005) strongly focused on solo exhibitions, often survey exhibitions, of international artists whose work is, in most cases, unknown to local audiences. The programme is also deeply committed to supporting Portuguese artists.

Expanding the horizon for the reception of contemporary art in Portugal and challenging how the Portuguese art world is framed have been driving forces behind Miguel’s curatorial practice.