ARTISTS

Simu Liu

Superstar

By Sandra Oh

As a fellow Ontarioan, I was already excited about Simu Liu when he was having “Canada success” on Kim’s Convenience. But since then, he’s been on a path that no Chinese Canadian has walked before. He’s part of the first generation of Asian Americans and Canadians to reach true stardom.

It’s been amazing to see how beautifully he’s balancing representing our community and staying true to himself. I saw Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings three times. I was so pleased to see Simu exercise his comedy chops, his fighting skills, his gravitas. I love his ability to poke fun at himself. And, of course, the guy looks great in a suit.

Simu has been working hard to get through closed doors, and now he wants to hold those doors open for others. You see him doing that through the way he speaks out against hateful violence, his openness about his own experiences of isolation and discrimination, his professional choices. He’s our superhero.

Oh is an Emmy-nominated actor

Faith Ringgold

Essential Visionary

By Thelma Golden

A Renaissance woman born in Harlem during its own Renaissance, Faith Ringgold has painted, sculpted, written, sewed, and incited change all her life. Her fundamental reinvention of narrative-based art, especially her panoptic elevation of the American craft tradition, has firmly established her as one of the great artists of our time. From the late ’60s, when she was protesting the exclusion of Black and women artists from museums, to the late 2010s, when the expanded Museum of Modern Art proudly hung her masterpiece, the painting (1967), Faith’s path has been courageous, profound, and unflinching in its depiction of contemporary society. Along the way, Faith created a global legacy with her beloved children’s books, including the award-winning favorite A creative force