Abstract
Geoffrey Miller has hypothesized that producing artwork functions as a mating display. Here we investigate the relationship between mating success and artistic success in a sample of 236 visual artists. Initially, we derived a measure of artistic success that covered a broad range of artistic behaviors and beliefs. As predicted by Miller’s evolutionary theory, more successful male artists had more sexual partners than less successful artists but this did not hold for female artists. Also, male artists with greater artistic success had a mating strategy based on longer term relationships. Overall the results provide partial support for the sexual selection hypothesis for the function of visual art.
Highlights
Various creative behaviors, including art, do not fit the adaptationist criteria for survival mechanisms, which include low phenotypic and genotypic variance, low heritability, and universality across individuals (Miller, 2000)
In a study considering the trade-offs people make in mate preferences, once men had found a partner with evidence of enough physical attractiveness and women had found a partner with enough resources creativity was the characteristic most likely to be sought by both men and women (Li et al, 2002)
Considering the variables that made up the artistic success variable, public display, minimum and maximum cost of art, and percentage of income earned from art could be taken as indicators of public endorsement of the artist’s work and as such could be argued to be indicators of quality of the artwork as perceived by the community
Summary
Various creative behaviors, including art, do not fit the adaptationist criteria for survival mechanisms, which include low phenotypic and genotypic variance, low heritability, and universality across individuals (Miller, 2000). Miller (2000) proposes that these behaviors may be products of mechanisms that evolved through sexual selection According to this theory, artworks should act as indicators of genetic and phenotypic quality, whose function is to attract mates, and so it follows that successfully creative individuals should have greater mating success. In terms of artistic production Miller (1999) claimed that there will be sexual dimorphism despite evidence for mutual mate choice in this trait. Support for this has been found in studies that demonstrated that male output for creative products, such as artwork, books, and scientific discoveries, was approximately 10 times that of females (Miller, 1999; Kanazawa, 2000). Strong cultural and social expectations of gender roles and stereotypes may play an important part in these behaviors
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