Richard Harlfinger was an Austrian landscape and war painter.

From 1892 to 1894 Harlfinger was a student at the private painting school Strehblow in Vienna. He then studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich with Nikolaus Gysis and Carl von Marr. He initially painted figure pictures such as Walpurgis Mornings and tightrope walkers, but soon turned to landscape painting. His preferred motifs were alpine landscapes. He became a member of the Vienna Secession in 1906 and was its president in 1918 and 1919. From 1917 he worked at the Vienna Women's Academy .

During the First World War, Harlfinger worked as a war painter in the art group of the Austro-Hungarian war press quarter. Some of the works created there were assigned to the then Imperial and Royal Army Museum.

He was married to the painter Fanny Zakucka .