Thomas Wagner, born in Mannheim in 1955, studied German and philosophy in Heidelberg and Brighton (Sussex). Alongside his studies, he worked as an art critic and freelance journalist, initially for the Heidelberg weekly "Communale" and from 1985 onwards for the magazine "das kunstwerk". Since 1986 he has been writing - initially as a freelancer - for the arts section of the "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung", focusing on literary and art criticism. In 1991 he joined the editorial staff, where he has been senior editor for visual arts and design since 2002. From 1995 to 1997, he was a visiting professor of art studies at the AdBK Nürnberg, where he has taught as an honorary professor since 1999. In the summer semester of 1998, he held a professorship in art history at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich.

In addition to numerous art criticisms on all important positions of classical modernism and international contemporary art as well as commentaries on art and cultural-political topics in the "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung," he has published essays on, among other things, the "Gegenwärtigen Rolle der Kunstkritik", the "Typus des postmaterialistischen Sammlers" regarding the works of Lothar Baumgarten and Neo Rauch, "Kunstkritik und Werturteil", and the aesthetic implications of the presentation concept of Wolfsburg. In 2006, a volume with selected texts on artists and exhibitions was published by Hatje Cantz under the title "Freihändig - Wahrnehmungen der Kunst". In June 2007, Merve Verlag published a collection of essays on major exhibitions such as the Kassel documenta and the Venice Biennales under the title "Im Schacht von Babel".