 Both contemporary social concerns as well as themes of industrial modernity had informed such works in the decades preceding Wouter's "The Ironer".Among painters who produced notable works on this theme were Edgar Degas, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, and Berthe Morisot.Morisot had done "Hanging the Laundry out to Dry" in 1875 and "The Farmer Hanging Laundry."