In the fifth century B.C.E., the Severe Style of the Transitional period gave way to the Classical period of Greek sculpture. The Discobolos (c. 450 B.C.) of Myron is an example of the developing severe style and was considered revolutionary in terms of its sense of movement, though this movement is restricted to one plane.
Phidias produced the great sculptures in the Parthenon, including the ivory and gold statue of Athena (c. 448-432 B.C.) at the beginning of the style that would mark the mature period of Classical Greece. In this era, the artist seemed intent on balancing the realities of structure with the needs of ideal beauty. Phidias did this with his statues within the Parthenon. In southern Greece, Polyclitus produced the free-standing Doryphoros (c. 450-440 B.C.) in bronze. This sculptor renowned to the point where Aristotle used the name Polyclitus and the word "sculptor" interchangeably. The work shows the imposition of a system of proportions that creates an ideal on the Doric order, with a slow forward walk implied in three dimensions.
The fourth century B.C., the late Classical period, showed a humanizing trend in sculpture with the nudes of Praxiteles (such as his Aphrodite of Cyrene from C. 100 B.C.)and in works such as Woman's Head (c. 350 B.C.) by Scopas or the Apoxyomenos (c. 330 B.C.) by Lysippus (a work showing action in the third dimension not unlike that of the Doryphoros). Under Lysippus, many of the earlier trends of the Classical period come together. These works celebrated the human form in stone, and they celebrated the human spirit in subject, movement, and elevation of the ideal.
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