Richard Bergh was born into a family of Swedish artists – his father was the landscape painter Edward Bergh, his mother Amanda was also a painter. He first received private lessons from a painter and from 1878, he studied at the Royal Swedish Academy of Fine Arts in Stockholm. Until the end of the 1880s, he stayed in Paris several times for longer periods. In 1883, Bergh showed one of his paintings for the first time at the Paris Salon and was awarded a medal. As a result, he was entrusted the Swedish contribution to the 1889 Universal Exhibition in Paris. Together with other Swedish painters who shared his interest in Symbolism and the art of Paul Gauguin, Bergh founded the Varberg School in 1893, whose artists left their mark on Romantic Nationalism in Sweden. Bergh was mainly active as a portrait painter. His portraits are characterised by Naturalism and precise psychological characterisation. Bergh was appointed head of the Royal Swedish Academy of Fine Arts and director of the Nationalmuseum in 1890. He also wrote numerous essays and articles on art theory.