Pure de Sitter, anti de Sitter, and orthogonal gauge theories in four-dimensional Euclidean spacetime are studied. It is shown that, if the theory is asymptotically free and a dynamical mass is generated, then an effective geometry may be induced and a gravity theory emerges. The asymptotic freedom and the running of the mass might account for an Inonu-Wigner contraction which induces a breaking of the gauge group to the Lorentz group, while the mass itself is responsible for the coset sector of the gauge field to be identified with the effective vierbein. Furthermore, the resulting local isometries are Lorentzian for the anti de Sitter group and Euclidean for the de Sitter and orthogonal groups.