Underwater museum set up off Queensland coastline becomes home to international artist's sculptures

Australia is home to the southern hemisphere's first fully underwater museum.

Eight sunken sculptures by environmental artist Jason deCaires Taylor now sit on the ocean floor around John Brewer Reef near Townsville, Queensland.

The concrete works have been added to the existing gallery, which opened in 2020 and includes a variety of installations, from a floating tree to an underwater greenhouse and a number of statues.

The latest works have been modelled on the likenesses of marine scientists and conservationists. Each sculpture has been anchored to the seabed and is designed to withstand a Category 4 cyclone.

Over time, it's expected the works will become a living museum, populated by sea life in the reef.

"Already, they [the sculptures] have a thin film of green algae that's forming, already there's some starfish that have crawled up beside, and there's some shoaling fish," Mr deCaires Taylor told the ABC.

The British artist's eight sculptures are the latest in his more than a thousand living artworks submerged across the world's oceans and seas.