Model of Motions is a collaboration between Sama Alshaibi and Michael Fadel. The multimedia installation brings together kinetic sculpture, video, sand, chain, and anchor to create a shifting passage between desert and sea.

At the center of the installation is Swell, a wood and metal vessel filled with white sand. The boat rocks gently as if moving over water, while a second mechanism causes the sand inside it to undulate. Nearby, Footsteps shows a male protagonist rowing an oar through an endless white desert. As the figure multiplies, the image recalls the mirroring and repetition found in Islamic art, where singular forms extend toward pattern, infinity, and the divine.

Linked by a partially buried anchor and metal chain, the works form a snaking path through sand, water, history, and imagination. Model of Motions reflects on the movement of cultures, commodities, and people across historic trade routes, while also pointing to the ecological and political pressures that produce displacement today. The installation becomes a metaphor for those stripped of roots and forced into uncertain passage.

Model of Motions was commissioned by the International Symposium on Electronic Art in 2014 and first exhibited in Dubai. It was later presented at Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art in 2016 and the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art in 2017.