A fore-edge painting is a scene painted on the edges of book pages. There are two basic forms, including paintings on fanned edges and closed edges. For the first type, the book's leaves must be fanned, exposing the pages' edges for the picture to become visible. For the second closed type, the image is visible only while the book is closed. The fundamental difference between the two fore-edge styles is that a painting on the closed edge is painted directly on the book's surface (the fore-edge being the opposite of the spine side). In contrast, the fanned fore-edge style has watercolor applied to the top or bottom margin (recto or verso) of the page/leaf and not to the actual "fore"-edge itself. To begin a fore-edge painting artists clamped the slightly fanned pages of a book between the boards of a special press that held them in place while keeping pressure off of the cover boards. While the paints used for fore-edge paintings are watercolors, artists needed to use them carefully. If water was first used on the pages the paint would bleed through to the inner pages or remove the gold of the fore-edges. Artists needed to slowly build up the colors of the fore-edges to avoid over saturating the paper. Watercolor was the only paint that could be used when doing these paintings because others (acrylics and oils) would crack and crumble with age. Variations A single fore-edge painting includes a painting on only one side of the book page edges. Generally, gilt or marbling is applied by the bookbinder after the painting has dried to make the painting completely invisible until the pages are fanned. A double fore-edge painting has paintings on both sides of the page margin so that one painting is visible when the leaves are fanned one way, and the other is visible when the leaves are fanned the other way. It is estimated that only 2-3% of fore-edge paintings are doubled. A triple fore-edge painting has, in addition to paintings on the edges, a third painting applied directly to the edges (in lieu of gilt or marbling). Edge paintings that are continuous scenes wrapped around more than one edge are called a panoramic fore-edge painting. These are sometimes called a 'triple edge painting.' A split double painting has two different illustrations, one on either side of the book's center. When the book is laid