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Robert B. Mayer (1910-1974) and Beatrice C. Mayer (1921-2018) were art collectors based in Chicago, Illinois. After graduating from the University of Chicago in 1941, Mayer joined his uncle's Chicago department store, Maurice L. Rothschild & Co., where he rose through the ranks and was eventually named president in 1957. In 1942, Robert was enlisted in the U.S. Army during the Second World War. While in Europe Mayer found solace in art and purchased works directly from artists like Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse while on leave in the south of France.
Upon his return to the United States, Robert met Beatrice 'Buddy' Cummings who was born in Montreal to Ruth and Nathan Cummings. Cummings was owner of the tremendously successful Consolidated Foods Corporation, later known as the Sara Lee Corporation. Beatrice received her bachelor's degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The Mayer family homes included the Edgecliff Estate in Winnetka, Illinois outside Chicago, The Chicago Ritz Carlton Hotel, and Harbour's Edge at Delray Beach, Florida.
The Mayer's were advocates for social justice. Beatrice traveled from Chicago to Mississippi in support of the Civil Rights Movement, sleeping in the home of a local agricultural worker and tutoring children on African American art and artists. Many of their causes and projects throughout the years reflect this commitment to community. Particularly invested in their city of Chicago, Robert was a founding trustee of The Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, as well as treasurer of the board. In 1974, the year of Robert's death, 'Buddy' Mayer also became an MCA trustee focusing on issues like accessibility and educational programming. By the late 1970s The Mayer Family Collection initiated a loan program in which pieces from the collection were loaned numerous university-affiliated museums around the country.
Like many collectors of the era, the Mayers initially focused on acquiring classic Impressionist and European Modernist works. By the late 1950s, the Mayer's had assembled a robust selection of European painting and sculpture, Chinese ceramics, and African and Oceanic figures. They soon turned to contemporary art as Impressionism became less attainable. Emerging artists included Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Robert Rauschenberg, and Marisol (Escobar), among others. The Mayer's collection would eventually be enhanced with works from the corporation's art collection, which was also dispersed to various institutions as gifts, as well as friends and family via sale in 1998, which was publicized in the media and in a traveling exhibition as the millennium gift.
Beatrice passed away in 2018 and the Mayer Family Collection was offered for sale at Christie's shortly after in 2019.
