Daniela Mayer is an independent researcher, curator, and educator based in New York.

Mayer is an independent researcher, curator, and educator specializing in modern and contemporary art, with a focus on transnational art networks across the Americas and at the intersections of identity, race, and socio-political histories.

Mayer was the curator of Cosmic Shelter: Hélio Oiticica and Neville D’Almeida’s Private Cosmococas, which was on view at the Hunter College Art Galleries from October 12, 2023, to March 30, 2024. This exhibition featured the U.S. premiere of two unique installations by the renowned Brazilian artists and emerged from Mayer’s master’s thesis, “An Outlaw in Babylon: Hélio Oiticica’s Transgressive Strategies in the Margins of New York, 1970–1978.”

In July 2024, Mayer curated Para Todos Todo, Free in the Open Air at MAMA Projects, marking the first solo exhibition in New York City for Colombian-American multidisciplinary artist Christina Barrera. Mayer also previously organized a symposium in collaboration with The Artist’s Institute at Hunter College and the Raw Material Company in Dakar, Senegal, in 2021, focusing on the intersections of arts, activism, and underrepresented histories. Mayer contributed to the curatorial team for Robert Rauschenberg: Night Shades and Phantoms (2019) at the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, where they authored the catalogue essay “Looking Also Happens in Time: Memory Traces in Robert Rauschenberg's Night Shades and Phantoms.”

Mayer’s research has appeared in Art Style: Art & Culture International Magazine and they are a contributing writer at Hyperallergic. Mayer was a lecturer at Hunter College and guest lectures at the School of Visual Arts. They were a fellow at the Renate, Hans and Maria Hofmann Trust and held various research and administrative roles at Hunter College, Sotheby’s, and Art21. Mayer holds an M.A. and Advanced Certificate in Curatorial Studies from Hunter College, and a B.A. from New York University.