Artwork of the Month: Seaside Café by Ilana Richardson
27 May 2025
This month, the artwork was chosen by members of the St George's Young Onset Dementia group. The St George’s Young Onset Support Group is a friendly support group for people under 65 diagnosed with dementia and their families.
It has been running since 2012 from St George’s Hospital and meets monthly to provide information, advice and support and the opportunity to meet others in a similar situation.
The group is funded by St George's Hospital Charity and it is facilitated by Nikki and Ollie, from Rare Dementia Support, and Alex, a Personal Trainer and Sports Therapist. They bring a wide range of skill sets to enhance wellbeing and empowerment, and guidance to live well.
Our Art Collection Officer, Rachel, visited a St George's Young Onset Dementia group session last week to lead the Artwork of the Month vote. The theme for May was travel and, after discussing the artworks as a group, the winner of the vote was Seaside Café by Ilana Richardson.
About the artwork:
In this artwork we see a sunny beach, viewed from inside a café. The waves lap gently against the shoreline of a beach. Pale yellow sand and the bright sunshine falls against the concrete floor of the café veranda through the lush green canopy. The bright red tablecloths draw the eye and a bottle on the table seems to invite the viewer to take a seat, relax, and take in the idyllic scene.
Seaside Café has been made using a technique called silkscreen printing. The printing screen used in this technique is a frame, generally made of metal or wood, which has a fine mesh fabric stretched over it. The fabric traditionally used is silk, but synthetic fabrics can also be used.
The design is created using stencils. These can be applied to the screen in a few different ways, such as a paper stencil, light sensitive emulsion, or glue. The screen is placed onto material which the design will be printed on, such as a textile or paper. Ink is placed along the edge of the board and pulled along the screen using a rubber blade called a squeegee. When the screen is removed, the design is behind.
This printing method can be repeated using different stencils to build up the design of the artwork.
This artwork can be found in Lanesborough Wing at St George’s Hospital.
About the artist:
Ilana Richardson was born in 1945 and grew up by the Mediterranean. She studied art in London and Jerusalem and has lived in the UK since 1974. She currently lives in Brighton.
She is an internationally recognised artist, known for her work in watercolour, and silkscreen and giclée prints. Her work depicts places she has travelled to, with skilful rendering of bright colours and the interplay of light and shadow. St George’s Art and Heritage Collection contains a number of her works, featuring the whitewashed walls and bright blue doors and shutters which are associated with the Mediterranean.
Her artworks can be found in several private and public collections, and The ART Group and IKEA have published her posters. She participates in the annual Artists Open Houses scheme in Brighton, and she is a member of the Sussex Watercolour Society.
Arts St George’s (part of St George’s Hospital Charity) is the arts programme for St George’s University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. To find out more, follow us on socials @artsstgeorges, or follow Arts St George's - St George's Hospital Charity
The 'Our Hospital: conserving, curating and responding to St George’s Art and Heritage Collection’ is a three-year project, funded by The National Lottery Heritage Fund and made possible by money raised by National Lottery players. The project is focusing on conserving, cataloguing, reinterpreting and digitising St George’s Hospital’s unique Art and Heritage Collection so it can be enjoyed by many more people.
