‘Dancer With Ribbon’ is Michael Rizzello’s tribute to Darcey Bussell high above Oxford Street

‘Dancer With Ribbon’ (1997) by Michael Rizzello … Darcey Bussell in bronze perched above the entrance to Next at 116-122 Oxford Street, with the initials B&H behind her (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

I probably ought not to walk around London with my head in the air without making sure my feet are firmly planted on the ground and that I am watching what lies before me. That probably explains why had a bad tumble and fell crossing Oxford Street and ended up in A&E in University College Hospital four months ago (7 February 2025).

But, walking along Oxford Street with my head in the air, yet again, last week, I noticed for the first time Michael Rizzello’s bronze sculpture, ‘Dancer With Ribbon’, a bronze sculpture inspired by the former ballerina and ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ judge Dame Darcey Bussell.

Michael Rizzello created this sinuous statue in 1997, when Darcey Bussell was well into her career. The bronze likeness perched above the entrance to Next at 116-122 Oxford Street was commissioned in 1996 when the former Bourne & Hollingsworth building was being redeveloped into the Plaza, a shopping and food outlet.

The building was designed by Slater and Moberly, an architectural partnership in London formed in the 1920s by John Alan Slater (1885-1963) and Arthur Hamilton Moberly (1886-1952). When Reginald Harold Uren (1906-1988) joined the practice in 1936, it was renamed Slater, Moberly and Uren, and it later became Slater, Uren and Pike.

Michael Gaspard Rizzello (1926-2004) was a sculptor and coin designer. Movement was a frequent element in his work – a difficult task in bronze – and it is famously seen in his statue of Lloyd George in Cardiff, where he shows the Welsh politician punching the air in a characteristic gesture.

Rizzello was born in London on 2 April 1926 of Italian parents, but never wanted to be a tailor like his father. He attended the London Oratory School and then enlisted in the army from 1944 to 1948.

He had a good baritone voice and almost became a professional singer. He had to choose between music and drawing, and chose to attend the Royal College of Art, where he won both the Drawing Prize and the Travelling Scholarship in Sculpture.

He studied sculpture in Rome for two years and was awarded the Prix de Rome 1951 for Sculpture at the British School at Rome. He began his career making wax heads for Madame Tussauds.

Rizzello had an unprecedented term of two five-year periods as President of the Royal Society of British Sculptors. His public work includes Dancer with Ribbon in Oxford Street and David Lloyd George in Cardiff. His portrait busts include Nelson Mandela and a bronze portrait of Lady Astor in the Palace of Westminster. He also designed coins and medals, including the Conspicuous Gallantry Cross and the £2 coin commemorating the 50th anniversary of the United Nations, both in 1995.

Rizzello was made an OBE in 1977. He died in London on 28 September 2004.

Rizzello’s vital, swirling image of Darcey Bussell has survived the recent development of the building as a flagship store for Next. The Bourne and Hollingworth shop was built 100 years ago in 1925 to designs by Slater and Moberly, but the interior has been totally rebuilt many times since.

The three green panels behind Darcey Bussell still carry the letters ‘B’ ‘&’ ‘H’. The building was named after the founders of the department store, the brothers-in-law Walter William Bourne and Howard E Hollingsworth, who started the business as a drapery shop in Westbourne Grove in 1894, and moves to the Oxford Street in 1902. The shop was remodelled by Slater and Moberly, but all the interiors were lost in the subsequent redesigning and rebuilding over the past century.

As for Darcey Bussell, she retired from ballet on 18 years ago on 8 June 2007. But she is still widely regarded as one of the finest British ballerinas – and you can see her dance if you keep looking up when you’re walking along Oxford Steet.

Daily prayer in Easter 2025: 46, Wednesday 4 June 2025

‘As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world’ (John 17: 18) … the astrolabe in Pusey House, Oxford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

Easter is a 50-day season, beginning on Easter Day (20 April 2025) and continuing through Ascension Day until the Day of Pentecost or Whit Sunday next Sunday (8 June 2025). This week began with the Seventh Sunday of Easter (Easter VII), and today the calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship recalls Petroc, the sixth century Abbot of Padstow.

Later today, I hope to take part in the choir rehearsals in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford. Before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, reading today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.

‘As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world’ (John 17: 18) … the Twelve Apostles in the top row of icons in the iconostasis in the Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral in Duke Street, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025; click on image for full-screen view)

John 17: 11-19 (NRSVA):

[Jesus said:] 11 ‘And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one. 12 While I was with them, I protected them in your name that you have given me. I guarded them, and not one of them was lost except the one destined to be lost, so that the scripture might be fulfilled. 13 But now I am coming to you, and I speak these things in the world so that they may have my joy made complete in themselves. 14 I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. 15 I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one. 16 They do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. 17 Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. 18 As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. 19 And for their sakes I sanctify myself, so that they also may be sanctified in truth.’

‘I speak these things in the world so that they may have my joy made complete in themselves’ (John 17: 13) … the apse in the Church of the Four Martyrs in Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Today’s Reflection:

As I was saying in my reflections on Sunday, we are, in some ways, caught in the church calendar in an in-between time, between Ascension Day, last Thursday [29 May 2025], and the Day of Pentecost next Sunday [8 June 2025].

The Gospel reading at the Eucharist today (John 17: 11-19) follows Christ’s ‘Farewell Discourse’ at the Last Supper (John 14: 1 to 16: 33), and Christ has just ended his instructions to his disciples, which conclude with the advice, ‘In the world you face persecution But take courage; I have conquered the world!’ (John 16: 33).

We are now reading from his prayer to the Father (John 17: 1-26), in which he summarises the significance of his life as the time for his glory – his Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension – has arrived.

This prayer is often referred to as the High Priestly Prayer, as it includes many of the elements of prayer a priest offers when a sacrifice is about to be made: glorification (verses 3-5, 25), remembrance of God’s work (verses 2, 6-8, 22, 23), intercession on behalf of others (verses 9, 11, 15, 20, 21, 24), and a declaration of the offering itself (verses 1, 5).

In the Orthodox Church, this passage is also read on the Seventh Sunday of Easter (1 June 2025), a day remembering the Fathers of the First Ecumenical Council at Nicaea in the year 325. We are celebrating the 1,700th anniversary of that council this year and its formulation of the Nicene Creed. That council condemned the heresy of Arianism that taught that the Son of God was created by the Father and that there was a time when the Son of God did not exist. Christ’s words here bear witness to his divinity and to his filial relationship with the Father.

In his time alone in the Garden of Gethsemane, Christ looks up to heaven. He prays to the Father, asking him to ‘glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you.’ Christ waits to be restored to his glory. He has come to earth to provide eternal life to all who believe. Now he prays to the Father for the disciples.

He has made the Father known to those who would believe. To John, the ‘world’, or the cosmos, is notable for its unbelief and hatred. The disciples have been faithful to ‘your word,’ to truth, to God, to Christ’s teachings.

They have come to realise the relationship of the Son to the Father. They know Christ’s origin and mission. This prayer is on behalf of believers, who are God’s, and not on behalf of all people. We hear that belonging to God implies belonging to the Son. Christ’s power and authority have been shown to them.

In his High Priestly Prayer, Christ asks four things of the Father:

• that they may be ‘one,’ as he and the Father are (verse 11)

• that they may have ‘my joy’ (verse 13)

• that they may be protected from the influence of evil (verse 15)

• that they may be able then to fulfil his mission in the world (verses 17-18).

Christ asks the Father to ‘protect them in your name,’ by his authority and as his representatives. The Father has given Christ this authority. He has protected them, except for one: Judas.

In fulfilment of ‘the scripture’, or by God’s will, he asks the Father to set them apart or sanctify them as they are sent out into the world (verses 17-19)… a theme we face again next Sunday, the Day of Pentecost.

Christ is risen!
The Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia!

‘I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world’ (John 17: 11) … the Friendship Globe in a park in Kuching marking Malaysia-China Friendship (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Today’s Prayers (Wednesday 4 June 2025):

The new edition of Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), covers the period from 1 July to 20 November 2025. The theme in the prayer diary this week (1-7 June) is ‘Volunteers’ Week’ and was introduced on Sunday by Carol Miller, Church Engagement Manager, USPG.

The USPG prayer diary invites us to pray today (Wednesday 4 June 2025):

Lord, we look outwards and ask for your provision for those who encounter food insecurity in their communities. We look to you, Bread of Life. We commit to generosity.

The Collect:

O God the King of glory,
you have exalted your only Son Jesus Christ
with great triumph to your kingdom in heaven:
we beseech you, leave us not comfortless,
but send your Holy Spirit to strengthen us
and exalt us to the place where our Saviour Christ is gone before,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Post Communion Prayer:

Eternal God, giver of love and power,
your Son Jesus Christ has sent us into all the world
to preach the gospel of his kingdom:
confirm us in this mission,
and help us to live the good news we proclaim;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

Risen, ascended Lord,
as we rejoice at your triumph,
fill your Church on earth with power and compassion,
that all who are estranged by sin
may find forgiveness and know your peace,
to the glory of God the Father.

Yesterday’s Reflections

Continued Tomorrow

‘As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world’ (John 17: 18) … going out into the world from All Saints’ Church, Calverton (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org