Jim Gary is the only sculptor ever invited to present a solo exhibition at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C., which opened on April 12, 1990. In January 2006, "Time" stated that Gary's work "delighted kids as well as curators, including those at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, where he had an acclaimed solo show in 1990." A video tribute to Jim Gary was featured by ABC News on "This Week with George Stefanopoulos" on Sunday, January 22, 2006. During the same month, on January 24, 2006, the "Los Angeles Times" reported in an article, "Jim Gary, 66; Artist Who Created Playful Dinosaur Skeletons From Car Parts", that some critics compared Jim Gary's sculptures with Pablo Picasso's famous bull's head made from a bicycle seat and handlebars. "The New York Times" devoted half of a page to their newsworthy obituary for Gary on January 19, 2006. Because of his international popularity his death was treated as news around the world and the Gary obituary ran the next day in the arts and leisure section of the globally distributed English language newspaper, the "International Herald Tribune", with the title, "Jim Gary, Sculptor in Metal".