Missing Heroes
In this series, Denise Hawrysio reworks earlier etchings created by dropping found rubble onto etching plates, which were then printed and hand-coloured. This project contrasts stochastic mark-making with representational drawings of women drawn from diverse contexts—ranging from World War II archival imagery to feminist icons and the artist’s own family.
By erasing these figures, Hawrysio leaves only a “ghostly presence”—a choice that reflects the lost or forgotten identities of many such heroes. This act serves as a conceptual reference to Robert Rauschenberg’s Erased de Kooning Drawing (1953), challenging traditional ideas of authorship and the permanence of the image. The printed marks are the product of a gestural performance, while the pencil drawings are rendered fragile and delicate through the act of erasure.
