Mik spent his childhood in Groningen and studied there from 1983 to 1988 at the Academie Minerva. He also had lessons from Fie Werkman. He had his first solo exhibition in 2000 at the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven under the title "Primal gestures, minor roles".

In 1997 Mik received the Sandberg Prize for his videos Lick (1996) and Fluff (1996). In 2002 received the Dr. Mik. A.H. Heineken Prize for Art.

Aernout Mik by Mary Hlavajova, curator of the Dutch pavilion in Venice, selected in 2007 for the Netherlands to take part in the Venice Biennale. In 1997, Mik, along with designer William Oorebeek this same thing to see. In 2001 he took part in "Post-Nature", an exhibition of Dutch art which took place in Venice. The work called Organic Escalator (2000) is housed in the Art Collection Fondation Pinault and was end-2007 in Lille on the exhibition "Passage du temps".