Wolfgang Jacobsen studied German, English, theater arts and art history in Goettingen and Berlin. Since the early 1980s, he has held positions as editor of the International Film Festival in Berlin, CineGraph Hamburg, and at the Deutschen Kinemathek, where he was responsible for publications and events. Currently, Jacobsen is head of research and publications. From 1991-2002, he conceived and organized film retrospectives and homages for the Berlin International Film Festival. He has curated exhibitions including in 1987, Film...Stadt...Kino...Berlin in the former Hotel Esplanade in Berlin for Berlin’s 750^th year anniversary (with Uta-Berg-Ganschow); G.W.Pabst in the Literaturhaus Berlin in 1997; and Kino. Movie. Cinéma at the Martin-Gropius-Bau for the 100^th anniversary of film (with Werner Sudendorf). He has co-curated with Werner Sudendorf and Hans Helmut Prinzler the permanent exhibition at the Filmmuseum Berlin, now called Museum for Film und Fernsehen.

He worked for the “Reihe Film” and was editor of the magazine FilmExil which was discontinued in 2005. From1989-2008, he was co-editor of the book series CineGraph (until 2008: 19 volumes). He is currently co-editor with Rolf Aurich of the book series Film & Writing which focuses on the history of German film criticism (17 volumes as of 2014) and Filit which examines in essay form the intersection between film and the other arts (11 volumes as of 2014). He is the author of numerous radio features on film and literature and co-authored with Martin Koerber and René Perraudin the documentary Pabst wieder sehen (Arte 1997) and Otto Preminger (Arte 1999).