Jelena Karleuša

Jelena Karleuša (Serbian Cyrillic: Јелена Карлеуша; born 17 August 1978) is a Serbian singer and media personality. Born and raised in Belgrade, she began her music career with the release of her debut album Ogledalce (1995) at the age of 16. Karleuša has released twelve studio albums to date and has held two major solo concerts in Belgrade: All About Diva at the Belgrade Arena (2010) and Viva La Diva at Ušće Park (2013).

Additionally, she served as a judge on the singing competition television shows Zvezde Granda (2015–2021) and Pinkove Zvezde (2025–present). Focus and W have described Karleuša as the "Lady Gaga of Serbia" and "Madonna of the Balkans" respectively. Her perception and popularity have been influenced by her controversial—often scrutinized—persona and art, as well as by her outspoken sociopolitical views and frequent disputes with other public figures.

Jelena Karleuša was born on 17 August 1978 in Belgrade, SR Serbia, SFR Yugoslavia. She is the only child to Ptuj-born journalist and radio host, Divna Karleuša (née Tomažič; 1958–2019), and Belgrade-born police chief, Dragan Karleuša (b. 1947). Her background is ethnically diverse, with ancestry from Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, and Serbia.

Her maternal grandfather, Jurij Tomažič, was an ethnic Slovene and JNA military pilot who died in a plane crash in 1967. Her maternal grandmother, Darina, was from Doboj, Bosnia and Herzegovina. On her paternal side, her grandfather, Pavle Karleuša, was born in Belgrade, although his parents were from the Lika region of Croatia, where the surname "Karleuša" originates. Her great-grandfather, Nikola Karleuša, was a Croatian Serb who served in the Austro-Hungarian Army. Her paternal grandmother's family came from Vranje, Serbia. Karleuša has stated that her maternal great-grandmother was an Austrian countess who has a street in Graz named after her, although this claim was denied by the city.

Karleuša grew up in the Fontana neighborhood of New Belgrade, where she lived with her mother after her parents' divorce. Karleuša has said that her father's repeated infidelity led to the end of the marriage and she witnessed one such incident herself. She has two younger half-brothers, Ivan and Nikola, from her father's second marriage. She attended Zemun Gymnasium, but eventually graduated from the New Belgrade High School of Tourism. According to Karleuša, she also attended music school and played the flute as a child.

At the age of 16, Karleuša made her recording debut with the album Ogledalce, released on 24 April 1995 by Diskos. In 2019, she revealed that Serbian pop-folk singer Dragana Mirković helped her to finance its recording. Her sophomore album, Ženite se, momci, was released the following year by PGP-RTS. It was followed by Veštice, vile (1997) and Jelena (1998), released through Zabava Miliona (ZaM). On these records Karleuša began working with prolific lyricist Marina Tucaković, who wrote some of her best-known songs. On 23 December 1999, she released her only album with Lepa Brena's label Grand Production, entitled Gili, gili.

Her sixth studio album, Za svoje godine, was released in January 2001 through Best Records. On 20 December 2002, Samo za tvoje oči was released by BK Sound. The album was produced by Phoebus in collaboration with Greek label Heaven Music. Karleuša also signed a four-year contract with Heaven Music.

In February 2004, Karleuša competed in the Serbian national selection for the Eurovision Song Contest, then called Beovizija, with the song "Moli me". She finished in 11th place and thus failed to qualify to the final. Following her performance on Beovizija, Karleuša allegedly got banned from Radio Television of Serbia by its director, Aleksandar Tijanić. According to Karleuša, the reason behind this decision was due to the fact that her appearance and music were deemed "inappropriate" by Tijanić. She would not feature on the channel until March 2017, when she was a guest on a talk show about fashion. On 22 February 2005, Karleuša released her first album under City Records, titled Magija. Her following album, JK Revolution, was released on 7 February 2008. It sold 280,000 units.

In March 2009, she was a guest on the third season of Big Brother VIP. On 15 July, Karleuša released her greatest hits compilation, titled The Diamond Collection. Later that year in December, she released the single "Insomnia", which covered a song from the Bollywood movie Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi. "Insomnia" became one of the first Serbian music videos to go viral on YouTube. Karleuša held her first major solo concert, All About Diva, in the Belgrade Arena on 15 May 2010, to an audience of 10,000 people. The All About Diva live album and DVD were released in November 2010. The same year, Karleuša also landed a column in the daily newspaper Kurir, which saw widespread attention for her progressive views, such as those on the LGBT community, but also for her outspoken comments on public figures like Ceca and Dragan Marković.

Her tenth studio album, Diva, was released on 11 June 2012, after being postponed several times. It was preceded by three singles: "Insomnia" (2009), "Muškarac koji mrzi žene" (2011) and "Nova religija (Plava Šeherezada)" (2011). Diva sold 100,000 copies. The album was promoted with her second major solo concert, Viva La Diva, on 15 June 2013 in Ušće, Belgrade. It began after over an hour of delay due to technical issues regarding video and audio production, which continued throughout the concert. Nevertheless, she managed to perform all of the songs. According to her management, there were 40,000 people at the concert, while other publications claim that there were 10,000 people. Afterwards, Karleuša faced backlash from the media, who described her concert as a failure by comparing it to Ceca's concert in Ušće, which was held later that month. Additionally, she cut her ties with RTV Pink and City Records following a disagreement with its owner and CEO, Željko Mitrović.

In September 2015, Karleuša joined the judging panel of the singing competition show Zvezde Granda. Throughout 2015, Karleuša received international attention after accusing Kim Kardashian, and later Beyoncé, of copying her fashion style. She was subsequently featured on The Wendy Williams Show, among many other international media outlets. The following year, Jelena's style was praised by Kardashian in her Woman Crush Wednesday blog, claiming that she had only heard of Karleuša after the allegations.

At the beginning of 2016, Karleuša revealed that Amy (2015), which won Best Documentary Feature Film at the 88th Academy Awards, falsely used unlicensed scenes from her Viva La Diva concert as ones of Amy Winehouse's last (her 2011 performance at Kalemegdan Park). Karleuša initially planned to settle a lawsuit for copyright infringement against the creators, but eventually gave up due to her "respect of the late singer". In March 2016, she made a guest performance at the Vodafone Park in Istanbul after her husband's (Duško Tošić) team, Beşiktaş J.K. had won the national championship. On 28 June 2017, Karleuša presented her first releases since 2013: duets with Aca Lukas and Azis, respectively titled "Bankina" and "Ostavljam te", which were performed during the live finale of Zvezde Granda.

On 29 January 2019, Karleuša performed "LaJK" featuring rapper Gazda Paja at the 2019 Music Awards Ceremony. On 24 May 2020, she held a live stream concert via music service YouBox, which attracted over 200,000 viewers. Karleuša was joined on stage by the girl-group Hurricane, who were supposed to represent Serbia at the Eurovision Song Contest that year before cancellation due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and singer Milica Pavlović. In September 2021, she announced her decision to quit Zvezde Granda after five consecutive seasons. For New Year's Eve, Karleuša performed alongside Marija Šerifović and Sara Jo in front of the House of the National Assembly to an estimated crowd of 50,000 people. In October 2022, she made her runway debut at the Steve Madden fashion show in Belgrade.

At the beginning of August 2023, composer and husband of Marina Tucaković, Aleksandar "Futa" Radulović, forced the closure of Karleuša's YouTube channel for alleged copyright infringement of his late wife's work. Subsequently, on 13 and 20 August, Karleuša released her long-awaited studio albums, entitled Alpha and Omega, under JK Entrainment and in distribution deal with Virgin Music Group and Telekom Srbija. On 18 September, the albums were promoted with a free entrance concert at the Belgrade Waterfront. The live show, which was broadcast on several regional TV channels, featured performances from the artists whom Karleuša collaborated with on Alpha and Omega – Milica Pavlović, Devito, Sajsi MC, and Mimi Mercedez.

On 1 March 2024, Karleuša walked the Vetements runway show during the Paris Fashion Week. Her runway walk in Paris appeared on 18 September 2024 in the "Georgina in Paris" episode of I Am Georgina. On 19 October 2024, Karleuša kicked off her Alpha and Omega Tour in the Jane Sandanski Arena in Skopje, North Macedonia. However, Skopje remained the only stop of the tour. On 25 November, Karleuša held a promo event at Galerija Belgrade for the launch of her fragrance and body mists, named JA after a track of Omega. Upon announcement of Karleuša's show in Kragujevac on 31 December 2024, due to her pro-government stance, citizens of Kragujevac started a petition against it that accumulated over 8,000 signatures by 17 December.

On New Year's Eve and New Year's Day, Karleuša performed in Kragujevac and Bor, respectively. Due to threats of riots by anti-government protesters, her Kragujevac show was protected by a large number of police forces. She claimed that the show had been attended by 70,000 people and chastised Radio Television of Serbia for not reporting about it. Karleuša's claims were supported by the pro-government tabloid Informer, but were soon debunked after photos from the show were shared online and it became apparent that the attendance was low. The Bor show was attended by an even lower number of people, estimated at around 1,000. On 7 January 2025, Christmas Day according to the Julian calendar followed by the Serbian Orthodox Church, Prva Srpska Televizija aired a television special Gala veče s Jelenom Karleušom featuring Karleuša performing in front of the Museum of Yugoslavia, accompanied by a symphony orchestra. The songs performed included a cover of "Vidovdan". Despite Karleuša dubbing it a celebration of 30th anniversary of her career, according to Nielsen Media Research, the special was seen by a lacklustre 6.13% of viewers. In honor of the 20th anniversary of Damir Handanović's career, Karleuša agreed to participate in his project Novi zvuk for which he rearranged a number of hits from his repertoire; Karleuša herself covered "Jedno đubre obično", originally performed by Katarina Grujić in 2013. The cover was released on 8 May 2025. On 3 August 2025, Karleuša held a public concert in Kopaonik, which the Municipality of Raška paid 2.4 million RSD for. It attracted merely around 200 people, despite free entry. On 15 August 2025, Karleuša and Željko Mitrović jointly announced that she would be joining the jury of Pinkove Zvezde. On 30 December 2025, Karleuša and Boki 13 released "Kaligula 2", a remix of Boki 13's 2010 track "Kaligula". The original song was initially intended for release by Karleuša and was meant to be premiered at All About Diva Show; however, she ultimately decided not to release it and instead gave it to Boki 13.

On 3 July 2026, Karleuša premiered the first single, "Sad je sve okej", from her upcoming album, Enigma, with a live performance during the season finale of Pinkove Zvezde. On 14 July 2026, she released 2 more singles—"Balkanboy" and "Mata Hari"—both with music videos.

Between 1999 and 2000, Karleuša dated mobster Zoran "Ćanda" Davidović. Ćanda was assassinated 23 March 2000 in an ambush in Novi Sad while on his way back home from a funeral; the culprits were never arrested, although they were presumed to be members of the Zemun Clan. Karleuša was the one who identified Ćanda's body. She later dedicated her Za svoje godine (2001) album track "Balada za Zorana" to him. She has also stated that she borrowed money to pay for his funeral expenses.

On 23 September 2004, Karleuša married Bojan Karić, the nephew of Serbian businessman and politician Bogoljub Karić. They separated four months later and divorced in March 2005. Karleuša later said that Bogoljub Karić had strongly opposed the marriage, citing her unpopularity in Serbia as the reason.

Because of her adovcacy for LGBT rights in Serbia, Karleuša was declared the Serbian female gay icon of 2010 by the Gay Lesbian Info Centre. In September 2017, she opened the annual Belgrade Pride as the parade's "godmother". As a practicing vegetarian, Karleuša has also been vocal on the topic of animal rights. In July 2018, she collaborated with PETA on their anti-fur campaign.

In addition, Karleuša has supported various other causes during her career. Following the 2014 Southeast Europe floods, she supplied Serbian shelters with basic necessities for three consecutive days. Same year, Karleuša and Tošić were amongst the few regional celebrities who financially contributed to ALS research after participating in the Ice Bucket Challenge. In 2015, she performed at Donna Ares' charity concert for victims of cancer in the Zetra Olympic Hall, Sarajevo. In December 2018, Karleuša donated 100,000 RSD to VK Partizan for pool-heating during winter seasons.

Karleuša has been referenced, portrayed, and discussed in various popular media domestically and internationally.

Elements of Karleuša's image have been discussed in academic and cultural writing. Her 2008 music video for "Slatka mala", which features male performers in drag, has been analyzed in studies of gender performance, queer aesthetics and turbo-folk culture in the Balkans.

In 2015, Karleuša was discussed on The Wendy Williams Show, mostly due to her accusations that Kim Kardashian and Beyoncé had copied her style and wardrobe.

In 2015, footage from Karleuša's 2013 Viva La Diva concert at Ušće in Belgrade was used in the documentary film Amy, where it was presented as footage from Amy Winehouse's final concert at Kalemegdan Fortress. In early 2016, Karleuša stated that the footage had been used without her authorization and announced plans to pursue legal action against the filmmakers. She later abandoned the planned lawsuit, citing her late respect for the singer.

In 2016, Karleuša was featured on Kim Kardashian's web blog Woman Crush Wednesday, in which Kardashian addressed the controversy surrounding alleged similarities between their fashion styles and expressed admiration for Karleuša's style.