If you are willing to accept some non-human based research in pursuit of the human, you might find these helpful. They have a pretty heavy biological and philosophical bent to them. Some like Gablik, Miller, Darwin, and Dissanyake provide pretty sweeping theories for the evolution of art and design (with varying levels of detail and different forms of evidence). Others deal mainly with theory and
research derived from observation of non-human animals. Still others use social science and humanities based approaches to the question (Loos/Danto (with Gablik replying in ‘progress in art’), Bergson, Luhmann). Also see Bobbi S. Low’s cite for what may be the only scientifically testable prediction in the bunch.

Donath, J.S. Signals, Truth and Design. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, forthcoming.

Burke, E. 1757. A philosophical enquiry into the origin of our ideas of the sublime and beautiful. R. and J. Dodsley, London.

Endler, J. A. 1992. Signals, signal conditions and the direction of evolution. American Naturalist 139:S125-S153.

Gablik, S. 1976. Progress in Art. Rizzoli International Publications, Inc., New York.

Kirkpatrick, M. 1982. Sexual selection and the evolution of female preference. Evolution 36:1-12.

Miller, G. F. 2001. Aesthetic fitness: How sexual selection shaped artistic virtuosity as a fitness indicator and aesthetic preferences as mate choice criteria. Bulletin of Psychology and the Arts 2:20-25.

Ryan, M. J. 1990. Sensory systems, sexual selection, and sensory exploitation. Oxford Surveys of Evolutionary Biology 7:157-195.

Scheib, J. E., S. W. Gangestad, and R. Thornhill. 1999. Facial attractiveness, symmetry, and cues of good genes. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B 226:1318-1321.

West-Eberhard, M. J. 1979. Sexual selection, social competition and evolution. Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 123:222-234.

Loos, A., & Opel, A. (1997). Ornament and Crime: Selected Essays. Ariadne Press (CA).

Ellen Dissanayake, Art and Intimacy: How the Arts Began (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2000),

Christy, J. H., and P. R. Y. Backwell. 1995. The Sensory Exploitation Hypothesis. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 10:417-417.

Laland, K. N. 1992. A Theoretical Investigation of the Role of Social Transmission in Evolution. Ethology and Sociobiology 13:87-113.

Miller, G. 2000. The Mating Mind: How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature. Doubleday, New York.

Nettle, D. and H. Clegg. Schizotypy, creativity and mating success in humans. Proc. R. Soc. B (2006) 273, 611–615

Kavolis, V. Community Dynamics and Artistic Creativity. American Sociological Review, Vol. 31, No. 2. (Apr., 1966), pp. 208-217.

Luhmann, N. Art as a social system. Stanford University Press. Stanford, Calif. 2000.

Network Theory—the Emergence of the Creative Enterprise. Albert-László Barabási. Science 29 April 2005:Vol. 308. no. 5722, pp. 639 – 641

Low, Bobbi S. 1979. Sexual selection and human ornamentation. In Chagnon, Napoleon A., and William Irons, eds., 462-87. – describes a test of sexual selection for art as the comparison of stable versus unstable symbolic systems

Danto, A. C. 1986. The Philosophical Disenfranchisement of Art. Columbia University Press, New York.

Darwin, C. 1871. The descent of man, and selection in relation to sex. John Murray, London.

Endler, J. A., and A. L. Basolo. 1998. Sensory Ecology, Receiver Biases, and Sexual Selection. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 13:415-420.

Lenski, R. 1999. A Distinction Between the Origin and Maintenance of Sex. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 12:1034-1036. -distinguishes between the orgin and maintenance of sexual reproduction

Turney J. (2004). THE ABSTRACT SUBLIME: Life as information waiting to be rewritten. Science as Culture, 13, 89-103. Retrieved July 17, 2008, from

http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/routledg/csac/2004/00000013/00000001/art00004

Dissanayake, E.: What Is Art For? Seattle, University of Washington
Press (1988)

Dissanayake, E.: Homo Aestheticus : Where Art Comes from and Why. 1st University of Washington Press ed. Seattle, University of Washington Press (1995)

Healy, S., & Braithwaite, V. (2000). Cognitive ecology: a field of substance? Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 15(1), 22-26.

Bergson, H. (2005). Creative Evolution. Cosimo Classics.

Ryan, M. J., Phelps, S. M., & R, A. S. (2001). How evolutionary history shapes recognition mechanisms. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 5(4), 143-148. Retrieved July 17, 2008, from http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6VH9-42PC695-G&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=7e622bb148b27c4cbf3d290d0a790563

Arak, A., & Enquist, M. (1995). Conflict, Receiver Bias and the Evolution of Signal Form. Philosophical Transactions: Biological Sciences, 349(1330), 337-344.

Endler, J. A., & Basolo, A. L. (1998). Sensory ecology, receiver biases and sexual selection. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 13(10), 415-420.

Jansson, L., & Enquist, M. (2003). Receiver bias for colourful signals. Animal Behaviour, 66(5), 965-971. Retrieved July 17, 2008, from http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6W9W-49J8TBN-J&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=d7fd52368874c927aac68023a8029efd

Scourfield, J., N. Martin, G. Lewis, and P. McGuffin. 1999. Heritability of social cognitive skills in children and adolescents. Br J Psychiatry 175:559-564.