Robin Eley was born in 1978 in London, England. In 1981 his family migrated to Australia where he completed his secondary education. In 1997 he moved to the United States where he would attend Westmont College, earning a Bachelor of Arts majoring in Art in 2001. Eley has been a finalist in numerous Australian art prizes, most notably Runner Up (2010) and Highly Commended (2011) in the Doug Moran National Portrait Prize, the world’s richest prize for portraiture.