Ludvig Richarde was a Swedish artist predominantly known as a painter of maritime scenes.

Otto Ludvig Svensson Richarde was born in 1862 and raised within earshot of the harbour bells at Gothenburg, a city where ships glided constantly into view, and the salt wind drifted through the streets of the old cathedral parish.

The son of a working family, his life unfolded just steps from the quays. It is easy to imagine the young Otto lingering at the water’s edge, watching merchant vessels rise and fall with the tide, sketchbook in hand, tracing the elegant geometry of masts and rigging.

Those early impressions - the creak of timbers, the rhythmic labour of fishermen, the sudden brightness of the western light over the Göta älv - shaped his inner landscape long before he received any formal training. When he later studied in Stockholm and Copenhagen, he carried with him the sense-memory of those childhood harbours: the bustle, the stillness, the slow, measured poetry of ships at rest or making ready to depart.

Across his career, Richarde’s paintings reveal an artist who saw the sea not only as a subject, but as a companion - changeable and deeply familiar. His work blends academic discipline with a tenderness for the everyday rhythms of coastal life, offering a calm, luminous counterpoint to the drama often found in Scandinavian marine art. Though never a widely documented figure, he remains a quietly evocative painter whose canvases capture both the beauty of Nordic waters and the dreams of a boy raised beside them.

Known For

Marine painting grounded in Nordic coastal life
Views of fishing boats, merchant vessels, and offshore light
A stylistic shift from darker academic realism to luminous Scandinavian atmospherics
Scenes from the coast around Gothenburg and later Hallandsåsen

Student Of

Formally trained in Stockholm (1879-1882).
Further study in Copenhagen (1884-1887), absorbing Danish marine clarity and plein-air light.

Lived In

Gothenburg (birthplace, early years, and final years)
Stockholm (student period)
Copenhagen (advanced study)
Masthugget, Gothenburg (married life)
Båstad and Hallandsåsen (later coastal work)
Gamlestaden, Gothenburg (place of death)

Public Collections

Gothenburg Art Museum, Gothenburg Historical Museum, Lund University collections

Timeline

1862

Born 3 June in Göteborgs Gustavi (Cathedral Parish), Gothenburg, to Ola Svensson and Maria Persson.

1879-1882

Studied in Stockholm, where academic draughtsmanship and structured realism underpin his early marine work.

1884-1887

Continued to study in Copenhagen, where the Danish maritime school influences his palette and atmospheric treatment of sea and sky.

1886-1892

Lived in Masthugget, Gothenburg; began his early professional career.

1887

Married Carolina Elisab Johansson on 26 December. Their daughter, Alva Viola Richarde, later appears in household records.

1890s

Refined a mature style characterised by softer light, clearer horizons, and the bright tonalities of Sweden’s west coast. Paints fishing vessels, quiet harbours, and coastal scenes around Hallandsåsen.

1929

Died 22 March in Göteborgs Gamlestad, aged 66.

Described By Others

Later Swedish sources describe him as a painter of “marines and coastal landscapes,” noting his training in Stockholm and Copenhagen and his affinity for the Nordic sea. Writers highlight the evocative clarity of his water and sky, the steady hand of a trained draughtsman, and the lyricism of an artist shaped by a lifetime beside the coast.