Interview With Robin Eisenberg

What's your favorite taco spot?
In LA, probably Guisados so far! But there are soooo many spots I want to try. The best tacos I've ever had were street tacos in Mexico City.

What brought you to Los Angeles? What keeps you here?
I was born in Burbank, grew up in Eagle Rock and then lived in Glendale when I was in high school. I moved around a lot after high school, and lived first in San Diego when I was in college, then Columbus (Ohio), then Berlin (Germany) and then a small town called Worcester in the UK. I loved living in other places but I always missed LA and it is still my favoritest city of all time. You can live here forever and always find new spots and unexplored streets. Also you can be antisocial for as long as you want and you know there will always be something neat happening when you finally want to leave the house. You’re so close to mountains, beaches, deserts, forests but in the middle of a city made of all these smaller cities! It’s an amazing place if you get restless like I do.

What were you like as a kid?
Really dorky but mayyyybe kind of weirdly cool in retrospect? Haha. I was obsessed with fantasy novels and Star Trek and drawing elves and unicorns. I collected swords and knives. I listened to a lot of Prince and Tori Amos and Erykah Badu and Enya. I read nonstop and wrote a lot of angsty poetry. I played a lot of PC computer games like King’s Quest and Quest For Glory. Ok… maybe I wasn't cool! Haha.

How did you get into illustration, and when did you realize it could be a career?
I have loved drawing for literally as long as I can remember. It's always been a constant even when I was trying out other career paths. Eventually I figured out that it was the thing I loved most so I should just focus on it entirely and then suddenly I was doing it full-time and it was actually working! Yay!

Have you ever drawn a taco?
I’m actually working on a drawing right now that features tacos!! Hopefully I can finish it and send it with this interview. [ED. note, she finished it, see below 😍]

What's your favorite hidden corner of Los Angeles?
There are so many! I’ll always have a soft spot for Kenneth Village in Glendale because I grew up next to it and worked at the old coffeeshop in the summer when I was home from college. Eagle Rock is also awesome. And I love Topanga and want to explore more of it.

Do you have a lucky number?
Hmmm… I don’t think so! I do like odd numbers and prime numbers and I like the number 17 in particular. Is that my lucky number? Maybe it should be. Hmmmm.

Which are your favorite plants?
I love most cacti and succulents as well as juniper, eucalyptus, lavender, sunflowers, and poppies.

Are you interested in space exploration? Would you go to Mars?
YES and YES! Although ideally it would be at a time where it doesn’t take quite as long to get there. Like if warp speed technology is available soon and I’m able to cruise around outer space for a long weekend I will be be totally there! I wish I could extend my lifespan so I could see how space exploration progresses in the future.

All time favorite... rock star? movie? animal? food?
Rock star: Jem (the original version of course)
Movie: some forever and current favs are Hackers, Wayne’s World, Down By Law, Labyrinth, The Craft, What We Do In the Shadows
Animal: dog or dragon
Food: some forever favs are mango and sticky rice, sourdough toast with butter, shrimp tacos, mac n cheese of all kinds, and chicken pot pie. Also I love strawberry frosted pop tarts but they always make my stomach hurt.

Describe yourself in 3 emoji.
👽,✨, and 😻 occasionally replaced with 😅

What's something you wish more people knew about in Los Angeles?
That there’s more to it than Hollywood and traffic! Not that there’s anything wrong with Hollywood. But it’s such a small part of what makes LA feel like LA to me, and it bums me out when people visit LA and just see Hollywood and nothing else. Traffic is a legitimate drag, though.

Got any shout-outs?
S/O to all of the amazing tacos out there, thank you for being so delicious.

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Visit RobinEisenberg.com for more.