Ajla Begović[1] (Serbian Cyrillic: Ајла Беговић; born 10 September 1991), better known under her birth name Dunja Ilić (Serbian Cyrillic: Дуња Илић), is a Serbian gothic pop-folk singer, songwriter, columnist, activist and author. She released a total of 3 studio albums; Misterija (2010), Živim na ivici (2011) and Gladna tvoje ljubavi (2013). She wrote 6 novels, of which she published only 3; Sat (2010), Božanstvena (2018) and Za gubtitak (2019). She wrote over 30 columns, and at the same time she was an activist for human rights.
Personal life
Ilić was born on September 10, 1991, in Belgrade. Even as a little girl, she had the desire to be a singer and to be involved in music and she also wanted to deal with criminology.
Dunja comes from a family of intellectuals from her mother Mirjana and father Jovan, and she also has a brother Tijan. In elementary school, she was extremely popular, but as she says, not as a princess from a fine family, but as an unbridled rebel. She went to choir and dramatic arts, but at the same time she developed her creativity and already at that age won the sympathy of those around her with her bold ideas.
At the age of fifteen, Dunja wrote the book Ludački pogled. At the age of sixteen, she wrote two more novels, Vatra and Ima nešto što mu nije rekla, but as her parents were divorcing during that period, and both novels seemed to be autobiographies, she gave up in order to protect her parents' privacy from the publication of the same, despite the insistence of publishing houses that the novels be published and appear at the book fair that year.
After that, she turns to school, completes two high school classes in one school year and decides to finally fulfill her childhood wishes and record her first song and music video.
She published her first published novel Sat in 2010.
She studied media culture at the University of Belgrade.
After three studio albums, over 10 high-budget music videos, Dunja decided to retire from the music scene because she believes that making music in Serbia is unprofitable, and the way she would do it would cost a lot financially, and she doesn't have the money for it because her father went bankrupt and the money she invested in her music career was never returned.
After she retired from the music scene in 2013, in 2014 she fell in love within a week, got engaged, and after a month married Saša Grujić, and divorced a month later. She said that they didn't know each other enough because everything was going too fast and they realized that they were quite different.
The second novel Božanstvena came into the hands of readers in December 2018, and already the following year she published the third novel Za gubitak.
Today she does several private jobs including reading tarot. She lives on the Belgrade-Sarajevo route.
Music career
2006–2010: Career beginnings
Since she wanted to be a singer from a young age, at only 15 years old, in 2006 she recorded two songs written for her by Marina Tucaković. However, Dunja's father Jovan did not allow them to be published in order to protect his daughter from the public.
Later, in 2011, one of the two songs that Dunja recorded in 2006 appeared on YouTube, and that was the song Ubičes me ti.
At the age of 18, Ilić recorded her first single Bidermajer in November 2009. The direction and script for the video was written by Dunja, and the video was declared full of morbidness by the audience, and one of the more morbid shots from the Bidermajer music video is the scene when Dunja lies in a coffin after the murder of her boyfriend's lover. Later in an interview, she said that the song is not dedicated to any ex-boyfriend, but to all her ex-friends who betrayed her.
Shortly after the release of the first single, Dunja released her first studio album Misterija in February 2010 for the publishing house “FM Sound Production”. There are 10 songs on the album, and the author of all the lyrics is Dunja. The CD has sold over 25,000 copies.
And in the same year, at the festival “Beogradski pobednik”, she performed the song Domino dama and received an award as the most promising young star.
2010–2011: Two hit singles and second studio album
In June 2010, Ilić recorded the single Šefica podzemlja, which was her biggest hit in her career. In November of the same year, she released the single Nisam laka, maco!.
The second studio album Živim na ivici was released on May 9, 2011, for the publishing house City Records. It was the first visual album in the Balkans. High-budget videos were recorded, which were declared the best and most expensive videos ever in this area. The entire project Živim na ivici is considered Dunja's most successful project in her career. CD was printed in a circulation of 50,000 copies.
2012–2013: Hit single and third studio albumEdit
In the summer of 2012, she recorded the hit single Noć je zvezdana, which was also recorded with a high-budget music video by “Visual Infinity” production.
Dunja released her third and last studio album Gladna tvoje ljubavi on July 18, 2013, for “KCN Records” and that album is considered Dunja's most mature album in her career.
2014–2015: Single, duet, farewell single and guest song in 2019
Although shortly after the release of her third studio album in 2013, she announced to her fans that she was retiring from the music scene and variety shows, on October 18, 2014, she released the single Nije me ubilo. And soon after that, on December 15, 2014, she recorded the first duet in her career, Million promila with Dimitri. She released her farewell single Oči ledene on October 13, 2015, and many of Dunja's fans consider it Dunja's most beautiful song in her career. In April 2019, she appeared as a guest in the song Da li je to ljubav ili strast by Stefan Dragojlović because it was his wish, considering that Dunja wrote music and lyrics for the song of the same name.
Da li je to ljubav ili strast (Guest in Stefan Dragojlović's song) (2019)
Videography
Bidermajer (2009)
Misterija (2010)
Šefica podzemlja (2010)
Nisam laka, maco! (2010)
Živim na ivici (2011)
U dahu (2011)
Navikla na poraze (2011)
Euforija (2011)
Pogledaj još jednom (2011)
Zla, luda kučka (2011)
Srce mekše od kašmira (2011)
Ne stiže me kajanje (2011)
Nisam na vreme priznala (2011)
Noć je zvezdana (2012)
Vrištaću (2013)
Scandals
From the beginning of her career, Dunja Ilić was considered a scandalous and controversial personality, and at the very beginning of her career in March 2010, she performed the song Seks, smrt, pare, moć i slava on Košava television, appearing in the clothes of a nun and at one point lifted her dress to reveal her panties and halter top. Then she caused general chaos in the public because many considered that move to be blasphemy, which Dunja immediately denied, saying that it was dedicated to girls who present themselves as "saints" and think the most about those 5 things that Dunja sang in the song.
In 2012, news broke that Dunja had converted to Islam and moved to Sarajevo, which she soon confirmed saying that it was the best decision in her life.
Dunja was arrested in 2013 because she crashed a car in the Belgrade neighborhood of Senjak, which she was driving while drunk. She then hit a parked car with her Audi, the wheel of which came off due to the force of the impact. The police determined that she had more than two parts per thousand of alcohol in her blood.
At the age of 23, after just a week of dating, she married Saša Grujić from Vranje, and their marriage lasted 12 days. Dunja claimed that she divorced because her husband is a drug addict.
Ilić admitted that she was being treated for drugs and alcohol. She got so drunk several times that she ended up on a gastric lavage;
"The treatment was terribly difficult, as is any isolation. The crises were terrible, painful both mentally and physically. It is an indescribable feeling of helplessness".
In 2016, she tried to engage in politics, but that engagement did not last long either.
In 2017, Dunja was brutally beaten in Priština, where she lived at the time. She posted photos on her Facebook profile where she is posing bloody, scratched and disheveled. She claimed that she was beaten because she was defending Serbia.
On September 19, 2019, Dunja went live on Instagram and told her followers that she was going to die in half an hour because she drank a few pills with alcohol. Dunja's boyfriend at the time called an ambulance and the doctors managed to save her life. She later said in an interview that it was a moment of helplessness and that she would never think of taking her own life again.
