Canadian arts newsmakers of 2010

Drake (above)

The Toronto rapper leapt to the top of the hip-hop ranks this year when his first full-length album, Thank Me Later, debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart. Drake has collaborated with everyone from Lil’ Wayne (his mentor) to Jay-Z to Kanye West to Rihanna (who admitted that they dated in 2009). And to quote one of his singles from 2010, “it’s far from over.”

James Cameron

In 2010, James Cameron’s 3D epic Avatar became the highest-grossing film of all time, surpassing Titanic (also directed by Cameron). Avatar was a multiple nominee at this year’s Academy Awards, and we all had visions of Cameron’s Best Director acceptance speech, which would surely include some grandiose, mildly inappropriate outburst along the lines of “I’m king of the world!” Alas, Oscar night belonged to Cameron’s ex-wife, Kathryn Bigelow, director of The Hurt Locker.

Johanna Skibsrud

If there’s such a thing as overnight celebrity in Canadian fiction, Johanna Skibsrud experienced it this year. When her novel The Sentimentalists — which centres on the complex relationship between a father and daughter — took the Giller prize in November, she was primed for a huge bump in book sales. But the win set off a controversy when her Nova Scotia-based publisher, Gaspereau Press, refused to allow a larger company to distribute the winning book. Gaspereau eventually signed a deal with publisher Douglas & McIntyre to print a paperback edition.

Justin Bieber

“J.B.,” “The Biebs,” “Biebster” — call him what you want, but Justin Bieber has taken over the world. Appearances by the pint-sized Stratford, Ont., native cause riots. When he changes the part in his hair, the blogosphere erupts. Meanwhile, the video for his 2009 single Baby now has over 400 million page views on YouTube. His album My World 2.0, released in March, debuted at No. 1. The feathery-haired singer now rakes in $300,000 for every concert he plays, has four American Music Awards and is up for a Grammy in 2011. It’s almost pointless to resist – almost.

Cory Monteith

In the Fox series Glee, Vancouver native Cory Monteith plays Finn Hudson, the hunky high school jock whose popularity takes a nosedive when he joins a school musical group. Glee’s phenomenal success in 2010 made celebrities of its young cast — most notably Monteith, Lea Michele and Dianne Agron, who appeared together in a provocative photo shoot in the November issue of GQ. Showing he hadn’t forsaken his native land, Monteith hosted the Gemini Awards in November.

K’naan

Born in war-torn Somalia and now living in Toronto, rapper K’naan enjoyed great success prior to this year. But when his ode to freedom, Wavin’ Flag, was chosen not only as a charity single for Haiti disaster relief but Coke’s theme for its 2010 World Cup campaign, it pushed K’naan into the stratosphere. For much of the year, the tune was inescapable. In anticipation of the World Cup, K’naan visited just about every corner of the globe this year — reminding people of the powerful story he embodies.

Kathleen Winter

This Montreal author became the subject of literary discussion this year when her debut novel, Annabel, was nominated for CanLit’s Big Three: the Giller prize, the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and the Governor General’s Award. Winter’s tale, about the life of an inter-sex child, failed to nab any of those titles, but the hubbub drew attention to one of our most promising scribes.

Anna Paquin

The HBO series True Blood has profited handsomely from our vampire obsession. In 2009, the Winnipeg-born Paquin won a Golden Globe for her portrayal of the show’s young lead, Sookie Stackhouse, who lives in a world where vampires can co-exist with humans. True Blood, known for its provocative sex scenes, turned up the heat even further when Paquin and co-stars Stephen Moyer and Alexander Skarsgard posed naked (and bloody) on the September cover of Rolling Stone. The feature appeared shortly after Paquin and Moyer got married, and five months after Paquin came out as bisexual in a PSA for the Give A Damn campaign.

Arcade Fire

Montreal-based rockers Arcade Fire released their third album, The Suburbs, to huge success this year — it debuted at No. 1. What’s more, critics raved about it. The eclectic band also did a lot of high-profile charity work in 2010, taking a lead in fund-raising efforts for Haiti. Their passion for the cause was partly motivated by co-founder Regine Chassagne's Haitian heritage, and they felt so strongly about it that they even licensed an older single, Wake Up, for a 2010 Super Bowl ad — on the condition that all proceeds go straight to earthquake relief.

Nikki Yanofsky

This Quebec teen was heard in homes across Canada this year, after she was chosen to sing I Believe, the anthem for Vancouver’s 2010 Winter Olympic Games, at the opening and closing ceremonies. The song went to No. 1, ended up going quadruple platinum, making her the youngest artist ever to achieve such success.