NEW YORK – It had been a tense, challenging Thursday evening in the riot-torn Twin Cities for Associated Press photographer Julio Cortez.
Midnight was fast approaching, and so was a lone protester carrying an upside-down U.S. flag. Aware of the flag’s power as a visual symbol, Cortez followed the man down the rubble-strewn street and took a photograph that soon rocketed around the world – the protester silhouetted against the flames of a burning liquor store, the light of the fire glowing through the fabric of the flag.
Taken at 11:59 p.m. and transmitted a few moments later, it swiftly produced powerful reactions — perhaps the most indelible image yet of the racial divisions and violent protests flaring after the death of George Floyd, a