Richard completed his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree at the University of the East, majoring in Advertising Arts. In 2007, he studied filmmaking at the Asian Film Academy in Busan, South Korea. His films have been officially selected in more than 150 international film festivals. In 2013, Legaspi received the prestigious UNESCO Laureate artist recognition in 2013. Legaspi was also a resident artist of the Università delle Idee in Italy where he also won the ILLY DESIGN PRIZE – Art for Social Change.
Legaspi is a two-time awardee of the Gawad Cultural Center of the Philippines for Alternative Film, a winner at the 62nd Carlos Palanca Awards for Literature in 2012, a nominee for the Gawad Urian award in 2013 and 2015, National Commission for Culture and the Arts Competitive Grant winner 2009 and 2012, Cinemalaya and Cinema One Film Festivals Jury Prize in 2009 and 2012, and International Photography Awards (IPA) 2017 – Silver Prize winner for moving images. Film Development Council of the Philippines acknowledged Legaspi as one of Philippine Film Ambassadors of 2017 in Kingston, Jamaica.
Legaspi was the first Filipino artist featured in a retrospective of Monsoon Asia Film Festival 2016 in Taiwan. He received the Taiwan prestigious grant in 2018 for ASEAN art visionaries for his documentary project Halfway Home (In Development). In 2019, he was selected for a workshop and forum in the Kota Kinabalu IFF for another documentary film, Place, Displace, and Replace.
This year, Legaspi will release his new short film Bakit Ako Sinusundan ng Buwan?, a competitive grant winner of NCCA’s Values Short Film Festival. Legaspi also recently received a script development fund under the Film development Council of the Philippines CreatePHFilms Fund first cycle.