Usually the term 'innovation' is used in connection with artists' and authors' themes and techniques. What we see in most studies about innovation is that its problematic aspects are related to problems in literary or artistic history and that scholars try to solve those problems in work-oriented research. Some scholars, however, especially emperical sociologists, claim that problems with respect to innovation cannot be solved without analyzing the cultural area where those problems arise.

The major question that this book discusses concerns the role of art committees, literary, art and film critics, art collectors, museum directors, academic writers and other 'gatekeepers' with regard to different forms of art in the interbellum period as well as after World War II.