Rudolf Ribarz was a well-respected painter of landscapes, seascapes, portraits, genre scenes and still life. Under the tutelage of Albert Zimmerman, Ribarz studied landscape painting at the Academy of Vienna. Among his colleagues there were Emil Jakob Schindler, Eugen Jettel and Robert Russ. Finishing his studies in 1869, Ribarz took part in the First International Art Exhibition in Munich. He moved to Paris in 1875, where he spent time with such notable artists as Corot, Dupre and Daubigny. His travels to the Normandy coast, the Netherlands and Belgium supplied him with preferred motifs. He first used a simple, introspective landscape painting (paysage intimate), and later a more decorative form.

Rudolf Ribarz won the gold medal in Paris at the Exposition Universelle and international acceptance with his panoramic work, Ansicht von Dordrecht (View of Dordrecht) in 1889. In 1900 he had to give up painting because of his successively worsening health. He died four years later. In 1936 in the Wien-Ottakring (16th District) was named the Ribarzgasse after him.