Gustaf Rydberg was a visual artist born in Malmö in 1835. He began his education with private tuition in Malmö, before he became a private student of Frederik Christian Kiaerskou in Copenhagen. He stayed there for three years while sporadically participating at the Academy of Fine Arts in Stockholm. His teachers there were Edvard Bergh and Johan Fredrik Höckert.
    From 1858 to 1864 he studied in Düsseldorf. His first instructor was the Norwegian landscape painter Hans Fredrik Gude, followed by Oswald Achenbach. From 1868–1886 he lived in Stockholm, but he made several trips to Düsseldorf in 1873, a short trip to Norway, and to Paris in 1875 in the company of the artist August Malmström. Rydberg was the last Scandinavian artist to be part of the Düsseldorf School as well as one of the first to travel to Paris and explore the Realist and Impressionist techniques taking hold.
    In 1866, he was named a member candidate at the Royal Academy and had his first exhibition. In 1868, he made a study trip to Norway in the company of King Karl XV. He was elected a full member of the Royal Academy in 1871 as the last Swedish artist to be named Royal Court Painter.
    Charles XV was his patron and close friend until his death in 1897. That same year the artist lived in Kristianstad and then in Malmö. From 1901–1902 he traveled to Italy where he painted studies on the Riviera.
     In 1916 Kristianstianstad Museum held an exhibition of Rydberg's artworks. His great breakthrough as an artist took place at an exhibition at the Academy of Fine Arts in 1920 where he was represented by 260 works. He is considered a forerunner of the Impressionists in Sweden, as in his painting, "Halmstack, dyngstad and secret house at Kronstad" from 1869.

     The artist is represented in these public institutions:

• National Museum in Stockholm

• Gothenburg Art Museum

• Malmö Museum

• Ystad Museum

• Hallwyl Museum

• Sörmlands Museum

​