Ernst Friedrich August Rietschel was a German sculptor.
Rietschel was born in Pulsnitz in Saxony the third child of Friedrich Ehrgott Rietschel and his wife Caroline.

From the age of 20 he became an art student at Dresden, and from 1826 was a pupil of Rauch in Berlin. He there gained an art studentship, and studied in Rome in 1827–28. After returning to Saxony, he soon brought himself into notice by a colossal statue of Frederick Augustus, King of Saxony; was elected a member of the academy of Dresden, and became one of the chief sculptors of his country. In 1832 he was elected to the Dresden professorship of sculpture, and had many foreign orders of merit conferred on him by the governments of different countries.

He died in Dresden in 1861 aged 56. He is buried in the Trinitatisfriedhof, north-east of the city centre.