Suzan's comment has made me go and look up the source of this expression in Tacitus, one of my favourite authors. It is the very last sentence of Annals, Book III, and refers to the funeral of Junia Tertulla, wife of Cassius and sister of Brutus, in AD 22:

"viginti clarissimarum familiarum imagines antelatae sunt, Manlii, Quinctii aliaque eiusdem nobilitatis nomina. sed praefulgebant Cassius atque Brutus eo ipso quod effigies eorum non visebantur."

Michael Grant translates this as follows:

"The effigies of twenty highly distinguished families, Manlii, Quinctii, and others equally aristocratic, headed the procession. But Cassius and Brutus were the most gloriously conspicuous – precisely because their statues were not to be seen."

The irony is devastating: Cassius and Brutus had been "airbrushed" out of history, along with the republic. Tacitus has no equal for this kind of thing.