‘Therapy In The Ghetto: Reimagined’ to Raise Mental Health Awareness in SF’s Bayview

When kids approach the San Francisco rapper Gunna Goes Global to ask why he wears an eyepatch — the result of being shot in the head at age 19 — he doesn’t see it as disrespectful.

“It’s a genuine question,” he recently said on the Blowin Smoke Podcast. “I wear this as a reminder of what I’ve been through, what I come from, and what I overcame.”

Rather than avoid his tumultuous past, he embraces it with a deep reverence. Over the years, Gunna Goes Global has emerged as a de facto spokesperson in defense of Frisco’s Black and underserved communities. Having appeared in The Last Black Man in San Francisco, the lyricist-actor is at the forefront of preserving the city’s cultural and artistic legacy, using his experiences to guide himself and those around him.

Currently, Gunna Goes Global is working toward a stronger sense of communal healing in his city with Therapy In The Ghetto: Reimagined. Initially released as the 17-track album Therapy In The Ghetto last summer, the project is now being remixed into a free gallery exhibit, which opens at the Ruth Williams Opera House in Bayview on Saturday, May 4.

“It’s a celebration. I ain’t gon’ lie; I’m excited. I’ve never seen anything like it in the space,” he says of the show. “We’ve turned [the album] into an experience centered around mental health topics such as depression, suicide, PTSD, postpartum, alcoholism, addiction, domestic violence and anxiety.”

In collaboration with Black On Both Sides — a resource and empowerment program that offers financial and creative support to San Francisco’s Black artists — and 100 MILLION Records, the exhibit features Gunna Goes Global’s music fused with photographs, video and community outreach organizations from the San Francisco areas where Gunna Goes Global grew up before gentrification.

In one area you might learn — through rap lyrics, medical definitions, photos and a brief clip — about the ways in which opioid addiction impacts certain neighborhoods of San Francisco. In another part of the gallery, you can speak with someone about it.

It’s not Gunna Goes Global’s first attempt at uniting San Franciscans to confront difficult issues. He’s been on local TV speaking out against educational injustice, and he appears on podcasts and web series to discuss topics traditionally shied away from, particularly among men and communities of color.

“A lot of popping pills, all that shit, it may feel good, but where you going to be at 50? Where you going to be at 40? Where you going to be at 60? What’s going to be the quality of life?” he said during an online interview series also titled “Therapy In The Ghetto”. In the multi-episode videos,  each session begins with a big-picture question, like “What would be some solutions for those who are in pain?” or “Have you ever dealt with financial poverty?” His answers regularly mix philosophical insight and hardened pragmatism.

At its nucleus, Therapy In The Ghetto — both the album and the upcoming exhibit — offers an inclusive space to poetically explore the effects of communal and personal traumas for communities deserving of that care.

“Mental health is applicable to those in historically marginalized communities, too,” he says.

‘Therapy in the Ghetto’ takes place on Saturday, May 4, from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. at the Ruth Williams Opera House (formerly the Bayview Opera House) in San Francisco. Details here.