Esther Planas, Barcelona 1960 lives between London and Barcelona since 1999.

Esther Planas’ research focuses on self-instituting practices during hostile times and spaces. She works with her project Escuela de Calor/School of Calidity to generate a series of ongoing situationist processes where urban sites are found, inhabited, and where unexpected encounters can happen. This "situations" confront and challenge notions of alienation and displacement across the urban context as produced by the politics of the City.

Her practice is strongly informed by her background in dance and theatre, and takes form multidimensionally as installation, film, lectures, publishing, performance, or sound interventions. Studied contemporary dance at Anna Maleras, Barcelona 1970’s, The London Contemporary Dance School (The Place) London, 1978-83, El Institut del Teatre, and at Area, Espai de Dansa i Creació, Barcelona 1980/1996.

Her works have been presented internationally including at South London Gallery, Beaconsfield, and Tate Britain Clore Auditorium, London, MACRO Museo Rome, Matadero Madrid, BCNProducció\10 Barcelona, Edinburgh College of Art, Scotland, and at various independent spaces as Proyectos Ultravioleta Guatemala, Helena Producciones, Cali Colombia, BetaLocal, Puerto Rico, Aformal Academy -digital dialogues Hong Kong-Shenzen Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism\Architecture, eme3 International Architectural Festival, Barcelona, Artlicks Festival, London, INCA Detroit, USA or Alkovi gallery, Helsinki, INDEX, Mexico.

She has interviewed or reviewed artist works and published in cultural magazines, artist catalogs or fanzines as The Critical Friend and /Seconds, London, “Description of a Dance” collaborative texts with Theo Cowley, London, MEXICAN EMBASSY, London, Mex, Paesaggio 5, Blauerhase, Venice, Manifestaciones Públicas de Afecto ed. Florencia Portocarrero (Proyecto AMIL, Lima) Centro Gallego de Arte Contemporaneo, CGAC, España, Open University of Catalonia, UOC, and has a published fiction Novella at FROZEN TEARS (writing-based project by artist John Russell) with Cabinet Gallery London 2004. Published DIY fanzine Dark Star 1998/2002, MACBA Arxius and PABD archive. In 1984-5 she published, edited, and contributed the magazine V.O. in Barcelona now at MACBA Arxius, Barcelona.

Esther Planas is a long-term contributor and ongoing member of the artist lead the co-operative artist research project Five Years, London based since 1999.

Planas was nominated for the Paul Hamlyn Foundation Prize, London in 2014.

In the last decade she has been studying critical theory and philosophy with two master degrees an MRes in Art Theory and Philosophy, UAL, London 2017 with the TRASK Foundation Grant, and a Master in Contemporary Philosophy and Critical Theory at The Centre for Research of Modern European Philosophy, CRMEP, Kingston University, London, UK 2022 with a grant for Foreign Studies by the Culture Department of la Generalitat de Catalonia-OSIC, 2021/22

Her latest commissioned work was for the Open University of Catalonia UOC, for the dept of curatorial studies led by Maria Iñigo Clavo, with the title: La Revolución de las Estatuas, 2021, Barcelona, Catalonia.