Secrets are complex—everybody has one, but nobody would want to be one. San Francisco-based artist Gina M. Contreras often suspects that she may be the proverbial secret lover, bearing herself and her complicated emotions around this status in her latest solo exhibition Amor Secreto at Hashimoto Contemporary San Francisco. Before all her paintings were even finished, she spoke with the gallery’s Katherine Hamilton about this new body of paintings, why being so vulnerable is a strength, and she unfurls a few hidden meanings behind repeated symbols and patterns.