Artist Louise Bourgeois died Monday in Manhattan following a heart attack. Her awesome, creepy sculptures—including this spider, Maman, outside the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain—shot her to fame in her 70s. [LAT; pic via Topyti's Flickr]

Kate Spade turns 47 today. Hedge fund manager Jim Chanos is turning 52. Former Observer owner Arthur Carter is 78. Jonathan Benno, Per Se's outgoing chef who will soon be opening a restaurant of his own, is 40. Annette de la Renta, the wife of Oscar de la Renta and a charity gala fixture, is turning 70. Ryan Seacrest turns 35. Ricky Martin is celebrating his 38th. Author Mary Higgins Clark is turning 82. Heiress Marylou Whitney is 84. And actor Mekhi Phifer is 35. A few people with Christmas birthdays are listed below.

• Less than two months after investor and philanthropist Ephraim Gildor put his duplex penthouse at the Park Laurel back on the market for $28 million, it looks like he's already found a buyer. The 7,758-square-foot apartment with seven bedrooms and terrace went into contract late last week. [Cityfile, PDE]
• Hedge fund manager Steve Eisman, who took a loss on the sale of his old apartment at 1125 Park Avenue back in August, has picked up something new. He's closed on a four-bedroom penthouse duplex at 1120 Park Avenue for $7.4 million, which is 36 percent less than the original asking price. [NYT]
• Christopher Nixon Cox, the grandson of Richard Nixon, has sold his two-bedroom apartment at 10 East 70th Street for $1.4 million. [Curbed]
• Renowned sculptor Louise Bourgeois has been identified as the buyer behind the purchase of costume designer William Ivey Long's townhouse on West 20th Street. Bourgeois' Easton Foundation picked up the building for $4.75 million and will reportedly use it as an exhibition space and archive for Bourgeois' collection of books and film. [NYT]

It can't be fun to have your birthday fall on Christmas, although if you're Jewish—like youthful financier/media mogul Bruce Wasserstein who will be celebrating his 61st birthday tomorrow—we're not sure it matters much. Others who can proudly proclaim they were born the same day as Jesus: Republican sorcerer Karl Rove is turning 58. Helena Christensen will be 40. Annie Lennox is turning 54. Dido is turning 37. Jimmy Buffett will be 62. Literary agent Esther Newberg will be 67. And artist Louise Bourgeois will be celebrating her 97th birthday.

Working well into her nineties, Bourgeois kept churning out the sculptures that made her one of the most famous American artists of the past 30 years. She passed away in 2010.