What drives crowdfunding intentions of artist-entrepreneurs? – Evidence from Norway

Abstract

Crowdfunding has been proclaimed as a new fundraising channel offering multiple benefits to artist-entrepreneurs, yet its use has been surprisingly underwhelming. The study examines the determinants of artist-entrepreneurs’ intentions to use crowdfunding in fundraising for their projects. It does so by suggesting and testing a model combining classical antecedents of intentions adopted from the theory of planned behaviour (i.e., attitudes (ATT), subjective norms (SUBN), perceived behaviour control (PBC), and self-efficacy (SELE)), and aspects specific to creative and artistic work (i.e., conventionality of creative work and the size of existing fanbase (FAB)). The analysis employs survey data collected from artist-entrepreneurs in Norway. Findings show that while ATT towards crowdfunding and SUBN are positively associated with crowdfunding intentions, SELE and PBC are not. Moreover, non-conventionality of creative work and FAB are positively associated with SELE and PBC, though they are not significantly associated with ATT and SUBN. These results remain stable even when controlling for sub-sectoral affiliations of artists based on the type of creative work they do.