‘Five Blacks’ is an edition of ten spot wall paintings, which can each only exist in one place at a time. Each work from the edition must contain 150 wall spots, though the size of the spots may vary according to the available wall space. The spots are painted directly onto the wall in a random colour order, for which 150 pots of paint in the correct shades are provided. Five random black spots must be included within the pattern, and no other colour is repeated within a painting.

The work is anomalous within the spot painting series due to its inclusion of black. In 1988, Hirst created the only spot painting on canvas to include a black spot – ‘Untitled (with Black Dot)’.