Their research, straddling sculpture and digital practices, is grounded on an interest in the limits and possibilities of language and storytelling.
A logic of refraction and redistribution of information bits is the constructive principle for hyper-layered, clue-bearing installations that observe the potential of a critical mass to contain meaning. In their practice, a case of study is often ‘rewritten’ through an injective research approach, making of it a tool for fantasy and speculation, and allowing stories to become unstable. With a sculptural attitude to sound, and a musical one to form, they bridge languages with a focus on machinic imagery, as a revealing space for the phenomenological structure of things. Appropriating codes and communicative formats, they explore the way that cosmologies come to be, worlds are built and myths are born.
Their work has been shown internationally, including recent solo shows such as À bloc (aaaa nordhavn, Copenhagen, 2025), Troopers (fffriedrich, Frankfurt am Main, 2025), and BONYLAB (Husslehof, Frankfurt am Main, 2024).
In 2024, the choral book BONYLAB - Takeover in three movements was published by windpark books following the duo’s eponymous solo show. Previously the same year, they were awarded the Staedelschule Portikus e.V. Rundgang Prize.
Simoncini and Diaferia are part of the network of Frankfurt-based artists behind Tearoom, an itinerant performance project whose iterations were held, among others, at the Architecture Biennale in Venice (2021), the Delfina Foundation in London (2023), the Vietnam Art Collection in Hanoi (2025), and the Kunstinstituut Melly in Rotterdam (2025).
Contact: simoncinidiaferia@gmail.com
EDUCATION (Elisa Diaferia)
2021 - 2025 Hochschule für Bildende Künste Städelschule, Frankfurt am Main (DE)
2017 - 2021 Bachelor Degree at Brera Academy of Fine Arts, Milan (IT)
EDUCATION (Juri Simoncini)
2022 - 2025 Hochschule für Bildende Künste Städelschule, Frankfurt am Main (DE)
2018 - 2022 Bachelor Degree at Brera Academy of Fine Arts, Milan (IT)
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2025 À bloc, aaaa nordhavn, Copenhagen (DK)
2025 Troopers, fffriedrich, Frankfurt am Main (DE)
2024 BONYLAB, Husslehof, Frankfurt am Main (DE)
2023 The best night goggles ever, Saasfee*satellit, Frankfurt am Main (DE)
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2025 Stipendium 4.0, Museum Wiesbaden (DE)
2025 Overture, Städel Museum, Frankfurt am Main (DE)
2025 House tension, Alte Schmelze, Frankfurt am Main (DE)
2025 Colloquial, Vietnam Art Collection, Hanoi (VN)
2024 TBH, Magma Maria, Offenbach am Main (DE)
2023 Tearoom Relay: PIT STOP, Delfina Foundation, London (UK)
2023 Care Package, Tunnel Tunnel, Lausanne (CH)
2023 Unorthodox way of opening up, Fondation Tschuess, Karlsruhe (DE)
2022 Saluti da CoCo!, Como Contemporanea, Como (IT)
2022 Brutal Tenderness, Studiolo, Golab Agency, Milano (IT)
2021 Slow Signal, Korean Pavillion Biennale Architettura 2021, Venezia (IT)
2021 Campo Minato, Como Contemporanea, Como (IT)
2021 PICK CLIQUE - Choose your fighter, Curated by Viola Morini, Como Contemporanea (CoCo), Como (IT)
2021 Semitraglia, Spazio Marea, Milan (IT)
2019 Teenage Wasteland, SpazioFico, Milano (IT)
2018 UHM, SpazioFico, Milano (IT)
AWARDS
2025 VG Award 2025, finalist
2025 Friederichs Stiftung - Absolventenausstellung Overture at Städel Museum, Frankfurt am Main
2024 Hochschule für Bildende Künste - Städelschule Portikus e.V. Rundgang Prize 2024
PRESS AND PUBLICATIONS
-Haegue Yang & Tearoom, text by Sophie Huang, ARTIFACT Journal, Issue #1, Spring-summer 2025 (ENG-VI)
https://www.vac.art/vi/copy-of-vb-artifact-journal
- BONYLAB - Takeover in three movements, Elisa Diaferia and Juri Simoncini with texts by Olga Hohmann, Anna Helena Marckwald, Viola Morini, Windpark books, 2024 (ENG)
https://windparkbooks.de/produkt/bonylab/
- Zoom-Out in die Selbstreflexion Miniaturen im Magma Maria, text by Anna Marckwald, gallerytalk.net, August 11, 2024 (DE)
https://www.gallerytalk.net/magma-maria-miniaturen-tbh/
- Episodio II Le città satelliti: Como / CoCo – ComoContemporanea, text by Eleonora Milani, Flash Art, 356 PRIMAVERA 2022, CROSS/ROADS, May 25, 2022 (ITA)
https://flash---art.it/article/crossroads-como/
- I vicini di casa: il tour d’arte subito fuori Milano / II, text by Annika Pettini, Zero magazine, February 17, 2022 (ITA)
https://zero.eu/it/news/i-vicini-di-casa-seconda-tappa-del-tour-darte-subito-fuori-milano/